Cleaning Zinc running board trim

[VWJoe]

After reading many, many posts on claening Zinc (i.e. using lemons, rubbing on tomato paste, using vinager, etc, etc.) I tried using some aluminum cleaner I had on hand. It worked great. I brushed on the jelly-like cleaner, let it set for 5 minutes, then scrubbed it with a fine 3M scotch brite pad (red or gray). Very little scrubbing was needed. Then I removed the cleaner with a wet towel. It removed all the white and dark gray corrosion and left the Zinc a dull aluminum color. I then used some Blue Magic chrome polish to bring back the shine. Each running board took about 30 minutes to complete and turned out great.