Don Terrill’s Speed-Talk

This is an odd question to ask on this forum, but what is a good company that can give me a reasonable price on some plating work. I'm not too particular what its plated with provided it leaves a clean uniform finish and is durable and won't rust.

This actually isn't on an engine part but golf heads, currently chome plated (but its in poor shape) cast iron. 10 heads, weigh about 1lb each, don't need anything fancy done, just plating.

melonite was mentioned, but I'm pretty open as to what is done. The only quote I could get was $40 a head for chrome, which is more than buying a new set of clubs.

Most big cities have a few plating companies so hit the yellow pages. The problem you will run into is they usually have a batch minimum, which seems to be $100 to $150 here in the Baltimore area or $10-15 a head for 10 pieces. In larger quantities the price is pretty much by surface area, adjusted by how hard it is to handle. For example, at my last job I would get round spacers (1" long 5/16" id 5/8" od tube) gold zinc plated in quantities of 500+ for $0.20 apiece (that's a chromate conversion coating on top of electrolytic zinc plating on mild steel). A 4' piece of 5/8"x16 ga wall square tube, mild steel, same gold zinc coating, was about $7 each in batches of 100. For you, I would go with nickel plating. Will look good but not as shiny as chrome, good rust protection, durable, and cheaper than chrome. It is more expensive than my gold zinc examples per square inch, but you still won't be over the lot minimum so it doesn't matter. You can go pretty thin but there is a mil-spec process that gives about 0.001" thickness that is very nice. If you are near Baltimore email me and I'll tell you the companies I've used.

ap72 wrote:This is an odd question to ask on this forum, but what is a good company that can give me a reasonable price on some plating work. I'm not too particular what its plated with provided it leaves a clean uniform finish and is durable and won't rust.

This actually isn't on an engine part but golf heads, currently chome plated (but its in poor shape) cast iron. 10 heads, weigh about 1lb each, don't need anything fancy done, just plating.

melonite was mentioned, but I'm pretty open as to what is done. The only quote I could get was $40 a head for chrome, which is more than buying a new set of clubs.

First you need to strip the old finish.
The surface can then be blasted or polished as you desire.
Then try electroless nickel. Its cheap and looks very goodl

I suspect getting the old finish off without screwing up the weight balance of the club head would be the biggest challenge. If they are cast iron, they must be a very old or collectible set.

Gold is a noble metal, and it does not take much to achieve good looks.
You can even do it yourself:

http://www.caswellplating.com/kits/index.html

Stripping chrome is part of the cost..