Benjiwah

The great thing about asking for critiques from my peers on this site is that it makes me take pause and question whether or not my first idea was the best one. So Grizzly Old Man, I have rethought my first version of the bombsite hood ornament and came up with another rendition that I feel works better for the Buick Bijou Super. I will post a picture tomorrow to get some more input....good night all.

843de

The great thing about you Ben, is that you let us peek at your creative processes, and you listen to our opinions. As an artist, it must be hard at times to hear "well that's nice..but", the thing that has set you apart from day 1 is your willingness to consider the "buts" and the "wells" with good humor and understanding.

Now just remember that when you're famous and people are saying "Who's Chip Foose?", please look back fondly on our pokey little site dedicated to a line of quirky but addicting little trucklets....And maybe we can get your autograph.

Benjiwah

Thank you for the compliment Mike! Your words are far too kind.

So here is the very rough mock up of the hood ornament. I think this one will work better on the Bijou Super than the last one. Still a ton of cleanup to do, but what do you all think?

Benjiwah

Grizzly old man

Where do you get plastic like that chrome plated then?

843de

Unless Ben is going to translate the mock-up into metal, there are services that can vacuum plate plastic and fiberglass. You just need to give it some fairly thick clearcoat protection, or the vacuum deposited "chrome"(actually aluminum), will wear off with handlng.

Those of us who grew up in the 60's and 70's remember how the chrome wore off the bumpers of our toy cars and trucks.

And to get away from how to plate plastic, I'm really digging the revised ornament Ben, it's a more cohesive look than the first evolution.

T 20

Gom,
Just do a Google search on "PLASTIC CHROME PLATING" in your town.
I got 3 hits in Sacramento, Calif.
I had my three bar grille done and it looks great!

843de,
The chrome the guy did on my grille was some kinda spray on system.
Went right on/over the epoxy filler I used on the grille...

Mo

Benjiwah

Thanks Mike and T 20, you guys beat me to it :)
I may try the chrome spray on system that T 20 is referring to. But if the results don't look good enough, I will just get busy doing some bench work and do a duplication of this one in aluminum.

Grizzly old man

At one of the many places I worked in my life we made wire shelves and baskets for refrigerators and freezers, they would put a shiny zinc or nickel coating on some, but most were powder coated.

They were experimenting with a high shine chrome color powder coat but it just wasn't quite right for the application.

One batch might come out just right but the next might be burned slightly and to dark and the next might be not be baked enough and the color would come off on your hands.

The majority of the powder coat shelves were white. You might be amazed at how many shades of white you can get using the same material and process.

In my youth I ran a body shop and had a few things I restored sent to the chromer. Most came out just dandy but a few had to be redone. Back then I knew some plastics were being chrome plated but nothing I ever fabricated got the treatment and I always wondered how they did that.

With the marvels of the internet at my disposal maybe I'll find a youtube vid that will show me.

Benjiwah

There are certainly a lot of videos showing the chrome paint process. It's actually pretty impressive, the results that they can
get from paint are quite convincing chrome.