best abrasive for maintenance cleaning commutators, slip rings etc 1

[Tmoose]

Resurrecting an old Winco 110 v generator. The slip rings are smooth, but kind of dark.

For some of their products Winco says re; commutators - "Clean and polish. Use 00 sandpaper and crocus cloth, never emery paper.

http://www.wincogen.com/winco_pdf_files/winco_60706-004_15_18_20_ptof_25ptoc_opm.pdf

On other equipment more similar to mine they say slip rings or collector rings should be smooth and chocolate brown normally and OK. page 6b here, so I'm leaning toward leaving it alone.

http://www.wincogen.com/winco_pdf_files/winco_53045-4r_bh_ws_opm.pdf

curiously, to me, there is some info about automotive generators in days gone by that emery is preferred due to no conductivity. As in plain bearings made of soft materials I figure the abrasive will embed and potentially chew up the other component in the sliding interface, so non-conductivity may be a minor requirement.

 

[burnt2x]

In my experience, we used crocus cloth. It worked for us, it should work for you, I guess.

 

[ScottyUK]

The dark patina is a generally sign of a healthy ring. If it is uniform in appearance around the ring I would leave it alone.

There are some images and guidelines which might help in this document from Carbone Lorraine:

http://www.mersen.com/uploads/tx_mersen/514_6-brushes-for-electrical-machines-en.pdf

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If we learn from our mistakes I'm getting a great education!

 

[rasevskii]

The patina on the positive ring will have a different shade than the negative one. This is normal. In some large machines it was common practice to reverse the connections to the brushholders about once a year to equalise the wear on the rings.

rasevskii