Posted by David Sherman on Saturday, December 24, 2005 at 6:48PM :
In Reply to: chrome plating posted by Steve Pellock on Saturday, December 24, 2005 at 3:30PM :
Chrome plating is very difficult to do well. Depending on the base metal, one has to plate on two other layers (copper and nickel, as I recall) before even getting to the chrome. Each has to adhere well and be very smooth, preferably buffed. The chemistry is simple in theory, but getting a smooth shiny well-stuck coating takes a lot of art and skill and little chemical tricks. Then there's also the fact that chrome salts are carcinogenic and cause skin ulcers (this isn't just environmentalist hype; it really is nasty). Pot metal is particularly tricky to plate over because the zinc is so reactive that it wants to dissolve in the plating solutions. It's expensive to have a plating shop do it, but that's because it's hard to do it well. If you do it yourself and it turns out badly, it won't matter how much you saved since it will always look bad.
I'm going to try nickel-plating some old stove parts at some point, but from what I've read, nickel is much easier to do. That's why old plumbing fixtures were nickel, rather than chrome, plated. If you really want to do it yourself, and the parts are brass or steel (rather than pot metal) you might try nickel plating, polish it very well and laquer it, and see if it's almost as good as chrome.