Oh, yeah, aluminum requires an oxidized surface layer to remain stable and non-reactive. This is also true of stainless steel. If you polish it and then coat it with oil, or anything else, before it regains it's protective "rust" coating, it will degrade. Aluminum should be dull, this indicates the passivated oxide layer is there. The only way to give aluminum a stable shiny polished look is anodizing or plating.
Also, to use that "little buffing thingy" :lol: , you need to get some compound like jeweler's rouge or any of its analogs, and load the buffer with compound by applying the compound to it while it's spinning. Then you can apply the buffer to the parts, and the polishing will begin in earnest. Using just the cotton buffer itself does nothing but remove a bit of dirt/oil/booger.
