Achieving polished finish on brushed surface

Following on from my Current Topical Moan & Rant regarding NATO fittings and the description of their finishing, i.e. 'satin' actually being blasted or PVD, I wonder if I could easily polish the brushed fittings back to shiny steel with Cape Cod? There's very little surface area to work on and I'm not looking for a mirror finish, just brighter and shinier than they currently are.

Has anyone done something similar?

Before anyone says it, the NATOs I've bought, and like, are currently unavailable with polished fittings. I would have bought those and dulled them slightly with a fine grade Scotch Pad, but I'm having to do it the other way round.

Can’t see the point in doing this job with Cape Cod when there are far easier ways to do it.

Use fine wet and dry paper (1500, 2000 or 3000grit) to remove the finish. Use wet and put a spot of detergent in the water. Finish with 3000 grit, then use metal polish (Solvol Autosol is good) to get a shine and remove the fine scratches from the wet and dry work.

FINALLY......finish off with Cape Cod. Cape Cod cloths are only any good for getting fine scratches out, they have their uses and I use them myself, but this has to be one of the most over-rated products publicised on this forum. People make fantastic claims for these things, but if they looked closely through a magnifier they’d see things differently.

It’s worth spending a few £££ to get a stock of the various fine grades of wet and dry paper and a tube of metal polish. Also worth getting a small flat rubber block approx 1.5”x0.5” plus a hardwood block the same size, these are invaluable for removing scratches from polished surfaces when used with wet and dry paper. Also worth getting a reasonably strong magnifier to inspect the surface, but with practice you can tell when something’s been polished properly.

For the OP’s job, at the very least I’d use metal polish in prefernce to cape cods. Autosol is readily available for around £5 from Halfords, it’s good stuff and it’s far more effective than Cape Cods.

Paul