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Plating and Clear Coat Die cast zinc to emulate 430SS

February 5, 2009

I am product design engineer in consumer products. I have a die cast zinc (Zamac 3) that I need to plate with nickel, chrome and clear coat to look like #4 brushed 430SS. Some areas of the part are mirror finish while others are brushed.
The clear coat needs to withstand 300F for 1 hour at 150hours, none continuous.

Question is which is the best chrome to use for color matching to a #4 brushed 430SS? Trivalent or Hexavalent (not considering the hexavalent issues)

Ronnie Tynes
product design - Nashville, Tennessee

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Ronnie,

Unless the clear coat is absolutely required I would leave it out. As far as which chrome to use.....I wouldn't use that either. Hex chrome is too blue and Tri chrome is too yellow. You would have to tint the clear coat to get the stainless color match.

I would use a tin/nickel bath as the final layer of plating. There are several good baths out there you can try. You may have to adjust the tin and nickel percentages somewhat to get the exact color you want.

Tim Hamlett, CEF
- West Palm Beach, Florida, USA
February 19, 2009