Chrome

D

Dan Robertson

New member
The chrome on the corners front bumper on my "new" 1950 has flaked off and the underlying bumper has rusted. The Chrome on the grille is also badly pitted. The car was parked in a garage with no door so the front end was exposed to the weather for well over 30 years. The rear bumper also has some missing chrome too but not nearly as bad as the front. From what I am finding on the Internet, the cost to re-chrome these parts could easily total more than the car cost new and I'm not in a position to pay that much. My question is more a matter of opinion. What would be wrong with painting those parts and what color would look best on a black car?
 
You could strip them and paint them silver. If the rest of the chrome is pitted and the black paint isnt perfect it doesnt look too awful. There are decent used chrome parts out there. I'm going through the same thing on a '51 Tudor. Once you start replacing chrome with new, you have to do everything to make it look right. IMO. Lets see some pics. We need more Shoeboxes on here. Good luck with your car... Mark
 
check your area for a bumper replacement company. Down South there are several places that will exchange your bumper for a re-chromed unit. I took my rusty pitted front bumper to a company in TN and exchanged it for a re-chromed bumper. The cost was $300.00.
Power coating is also an option (see attached). A friend had his 40 grille done for $100.00.
Hope this helps.
 

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There's "triple chrome plating" and there's "nickel chrome" plating which is way less $$$$ due to not using copper. It doesn't hurt to have nickel chrome on a bumper and some shops are quite good at it. The bumper exchange mentioned above most likely does the latter, and I just had 2 Packard bumpers done that way and they look just fine.
 
Somebody (Carpenter, I think) has complete new grilles and PL extensions for sale. IIRC, they are a lot cheaper than a re-chrome job. I have no experience with them, so I have no idea about quality, but they might be worth looking into.

Also, if you know somebody with a repair shop, body shop, etc. re-chroming bumpers is almost a "commodity", so it sometimes can be found reasonably.
 
theHIGHLANDER said:
There's "triple chrome plating" and there's "nickel chrome" plating which is way less $$$$ due to not using copper. It doesn't hurt to have nickel chrome on a bumper and some shops are quite good at it. The bumper exchange mentioned above most likely does the latter, and I just had 2 Packard bumpers done that way and they look just fine.
Click to expand...

That was the problem with the Korea era chrome, no copper.
 
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