Zinc plating...yes or no?

7173bmw

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My suspension is getting ready to be dropped so that additional metal and body work can be completed before going to paint.

What are the general thoughts on zinc plating the hardware vs buying new(if available)? Disc brake shields....zinc or powdercoat?

Thanks
 

sfdon

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Hardware new....
Who wants used, beat up shiny hardware?
On sale at Walloth?
 

deQuincey

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Buy new.
Respect or overpass specs
Try to get them in best treatment available. I.e. i buy according to specs and then get matt chromed
Of course my recommendations might not be for everyone. But i can make my list drive to the shop get them over the counter put them in a bag bring them to the chrome shop and pick them up the next day
 

HB Chris

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Use Belmetric in Boston for yellow zinc nuts, bolts and washers. A small family run business that ships the same day. Walloth also sells packaged nut and bolt groupings. Powdercoat dust shields and stuff like that.
 

Bert Poliakoff

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For small quantities it pays to buy new. In AZ we can still get cadmium plating done as we don't have the stringent EPA restrictions like CA and possibly other states. Since, as far as I know, all the bolts and brackets that show plating were yellow cadmium and since I am anal, I wanted all original bolts with manufacturers stampings on the heads. So I brought a good 100#s of original nuts, bolts, screws, nuts and brackets from my car plus whatever extras I picked up along the way to a local plater and $100s of dollars later had all new, and I mean new looking yellow cad hardware with original manufacturer stampings on the heads. I do get excited enough to sit and just stare at them sometimes! Again, this only makes financial sense for getting large quantities done. Several bolts that got lost along the way or that I broke on installation and had to replace, I did buy new from the dealer and they did have original stampings on the heads and did match up with my new plating
 

mark99

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You can have yellow zinc as well, I had some spoke nipples done and asked for light yellow and they look great
I did lots of regular and yellow zinc for the car
if something is not bent but just a bit old looking you can have it zinc plated, I did the headlight buckets, all the door, hood type latches..
 

Wladek

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Sorry guys, but maybe in your South climate, nuts & bolts after 40-45 years are ok, but here in East-North part of Europe most of them are much worn out/rusted etc. & as for me all are trash, zinc plating will give them just some bling bling, but technically they are wasted. I personally broked around 20x.

If we talk about zinc plating of good condition / usable used parts for example: axles, struts, calipers, springs or cover plates - it is very good, because it is additional protection for metal oxydation process & in addition with powder coating, part will be rust free for much, much longer, than just raw metal painted with standard paint or even powder coated.

Working parts like brake discs etc. it is always better to replace with new one's. Ask yourself a simple question - when in your daily driver car start to have an issues or have worn out part, do you take it to for zinc plating or powder coating? probably not; - it is pretty obvious that you just replace defective part with new one, or at least for fully/professionally rebuild one.
Of course if you brake discs are like new or have almost fabric specs (thickness, flatness etc.) you can zinc plate it to avoid rust.
 
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