Brush / Wand Electroplating

[AshimotoK0]

I recently started zinc plating my own parts again, since there are no local platers near to me, who will do small batches (nearest is 60 miles away). I have been obtaining  pretty good results .. probably on par with what Allenchrome did for me in the past professionally. A real PITA in terms of the prep. required to get good results though, particularly if you have loads to do and the items are large. My advice if you are going to try it yourself is go to Gateros and not the other outfit who sell home plating stuff called Youplate. I got crap results with the latter despite loads of emails to the owner. In the end I just voted with my feet, cut my losses and went back to Gateros zinc chemicals, which give great results with little hassle, in terms of the finish achieved. I thhink the key is that Gateros buy in relatively expensive brighteners, which work really well.

Recently I have been putting together the TLS brake linkages for my CB72 and CB450K0. Some people don't de-rivet these before re-chroming but that seems really bodgy to me and the chromers don't like it either. I was therefore faced with  drilling out the old rivets and making new ones on my little lathe/milling machine and my mate Graham suggested I make two part replacements, that are bonded with Loctite in stainless steel, which don't require any riveting.  I made the nine sets I needed (took a long time as I am not proficient at turning  ). Then I pondered and procrastinated and worried that the b*ggers may come apart some time in the future ... not good on brake parts, so I decided to scrap them and make some the same as the originals out of high tensile steel. Graham said he didn't use stainless steel to make conventional rivets because it doesn't peen over very well and has a tendency to split.

I made the 9 steel rivets in carbon steel (EN8) but obliviously, with the stainless ones,  you can polish to a high shine to look like chrome. I have always wondered about plating things like the peened over  fitting in alloy brake plates (CB750, 500 etc) and decided I would get some brush/wand plating chemicals, make some 'wands' and have  a go at zinc plating the steel fitting in the alloy brake plates and also copy chrome for the little TLS rivets.

I have not tried the zinc yet but the copy chrome on the rivet heads has turned out pretty nice. I did have  a go with copy chrome back in 2013 and didn't get decent results ...plus before I had chance to experiment further we were flooded, where I was working,  and all of my plating chemicals were trashed.

Just wondering if anyone else on here  has had a go at brush plating ... It could be useful for the parts mentioned above and also parts like Honda 400 horns, where everything is crimped/riveted together.

This PHd. guy is a bit of a guru on it and I bought his zinc brush plating solution but, as I say I haven't tried it out yet.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ukDXyqnpRs

The bright nickel and copy chrome (actually bright cobalt/nickel) I bought from Gateros.... The guy at Gateros told me not to use stainless steel anodes but to use pure nickel as when uses SS then iron and chromium get deposited into the electrolyte and the electrolyte degrades rapidly) 

I don't think large items in copy chrome will look too good .. you can tell it's not 'proper' chrome but on very small parts it's worked out OK for me.

The chaps at Motoclassics (who up until recently owned Caswell Europe) ... gave me this excellent plating manual ... well worth a read!

https://www.dropbox.com/s/sgwx5sfjni2fwkx/Caswell%20Plating%20Manual.pdf?dl=0

[McCabe-Thiele (Ted)]

Interesting read Ash I admire your patience in making the small parts you need.

[Laverda Dave]

I agree with Ted. Ash you must have the patience of a saint to make up the rivets on a lathe only to scrap them and work on another idea. Like you I'm not a pro on the lathe and spent three days this week making up various spacers, fibre washers etc on my little Myford for the Triton rebuild, I would have been really cheesed off to have scrapped the lot!
Good luck with the plating.
As an aside and not wanting to hijack your thread but did you see Car SOS this week? They restored a Dennis fire engine. The interesting part was the 'rechroming' of the headlight rims. They put the parts in some kind of vacuum and fired argon gas as an aluminium sheet with the result the aluminium particles deposited on the headlight rims. They looked like chrome! I don't now how it worked but very impressive. Could you try this on your linkage?

[AshimotoK0]

Only time I did that Dave was when I was at Uni in the 70s silvering mirrors. I think the equipment would be quite expensive though. Didn't see the programme .. I will check it out.

[Rozabikes Tim]

I agree with Ted. Ash you must have the patience of a saint to make up the rivets on a lathe only to scrap them and work on another idea. Like you I'm not a pro on the lathe and spent three days this week making up various spacers, fibre washers etc on my little Myford for the Triton rebuild, I would have been really cheesed off to have scrapped the lot!
Good luck with the plating.
As an aside and not wanting to hijack your thread but did you see Car SOS this week? They restored a Dennis fire engine. The interesting part was the 'rechroming' of the headlight rims. They put the parts in some kind of vacuum and fired argon gas as an aluminium sheet with the result the aluminium particles deposited on the headlight rims. They looked like chrome! I don't now how it worked but very impressive. Could you try this on your linkage?

I saw that Dave and nearly posted similar. Wonder how that would scale up? Expensive kit but cant be cheap running conventional chroming outfit. No nasty chemicals either. Interesting.....
Either same programme or wheeler dealers recently and they were de rusting with lasers!

[AshimotoK0]

The laser cleaning I saw was on Edd Chinas YouTube series .. looked a pretty slow process compared with conventional blasting though. Also saw a place in Brum clear anodizing trim off an Alfa (I think) Interested as I need to get my ultra ultra ultra rare 1961 CB92 alloy  mudguard clear anodized .... It was on Salvage Hunters classic car resto show.

Update!  ... car was an NSU Ro80 not Alfa and this was the firm in Brum who did the clear anodizing:

https://www.badgeranodising.co.uk/

[Lobo]

Blimey Ash…. there’s a SOHC business opportunity for you here; you can become the Peter Horton of Plating! (Hi Peter!)

Just yesterday I’ve ordered a 10L Triple kit to include Colbalt-Nickel plating in the hope of ‘chrome plating’ the ‘750 carb lifter forks …. and having browsed the plating manual am somewhat concerned that I’ve bitten off more than I can chew ☹️.

[AshimotoK0]

Blimey Ash…. there’s a SOHC business opportunity for you here; you can become the Peter Horton of Plating! (Hi Peter!)

Just yesterday I’ve ordered a 10L Triple kit to include Colbalt-Nickel plating in the hope of ‘chrome plating’ the ‘750 carb lifter forks …. and having browsed the plating manual am somewhat concerned that I’ve bitten off more than I can chew ☹️.

I think your main problem Simon is that the carb. lifters are alloy and alloy is difficult to plate onto. I think you start with zincate treatment but never tried it myself.

[Lobo]

Ah, thanks Ash… it comes with a manual so a bit of homework will be needed first. Have I wrongly assumed the ‘strike kit’ (ie pre-copper plating) will not facilitate the Cobalt Nickel?
Honda obviously ‘chrome’ plated these lifters …. I wonder how?

[AshimotoK0]

Ah, thanks Ash… it comes with a manual so a bit of homework will be needed first. Have I wrongly assumed the ‘strike kit’ (ie pre-copper plating) will not facilitate the Cobalt Nickel?
Honda obviously ‘chrome’ plated these lifters …. I wonder how?

If you haven't done already read the Caswell manual linked above and here again.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/sgwx5sfjni2fwkx/Caswell%20Plating%20Manual.pdf?dl=0

 If you can get decent results, then that carb linkage bar may be a good example of something that should look OK with replica chrome. I wouldn't dream of having a large item done in it though.

However, most (possibly all) of  the modern  production vehicles I don't believe have chromium in the finish .. but I could be wrong. You can see it in the finish.. not a blingy as 'proper' chrome but quite acceptable.

Anyone on here know anyrthing about the 'chrome' alternative on modern vehicles?

[Oddjob]

I'd just polish the shite out of that Lobo. Do it good enough and it's as bright as chrome.

[AshimotoK0]

I'd just polish the shite out of that Lobo. Do it good enough and it's as bright as chrome.

Good idea Ken .. after all the carb mount plate etc. is just like that. Removing chrome not too easy though unless you go to a chromers to reverse strip it in a plating tank. So I guess it's various Dremel bits and loads of elbow grease. You would have to do both lifters too otherwise it may look a bit odd.

[Oddjob]

Shame Lobo is in Oz, I'd have liked that challenge. I do have the Gateros chrome stripping kit and the nickel one too. On alloy I can usually just sand if off though, chrome is a doodle to remove, it's the underlying layer that causes the problems.