Thread: bumper repair

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I bought an old 37 ford bumper and it is very pitted. what is the best method to go about trying to get this thing ready to be chromed?

I'm not real sure how far gone it can be to bring it back, but this one seems pretty bad. I would just buy a new one for $300, but this is going on my 35 and I'm not sure yet if I can get buy with just bolting a 37 bumper on so I bought this to possibly cut up and rechrome. Any suggestions?

The usual repair/preparation for decorative chrome is multiple layers of copper plate with buffing in between coats. At a plating shop there is as much time and labor in the buffing step as there is in the actual plating step. If the pits are very deep you could probably use brazing to fill them in followed by copper plating and buffing. Remember, no chrome plated surface will look better than the buffed surface. As I recall the '37 bumper is/was a custom car favorite so it is probably worth extra effort to save it even if you intend to bob the ends. One strong recommendation is to realize that chrome plating alone will not easily fill in deep pits so it is worth a few times in the copper tank first, but your plater already knows this and if you tell him/her(?) that you want a decorative chrome finish he/she will already know to use copper plating first. I have dealt with several shops and it is not unusual to meet a Mom and Pop at the shop and the wife will know what to charge! For the last resort you could use body filler and then paint the bumper if the pits are really deep.

Don Shillady
Retired Scientist/teen rodder

Don- Do you know of any local shops or have you only dealt with ones out of the area? I would like to maybe take the bumper to a shop in person and see what they think of the condition and how much it would cost to save it.

Is there a certain way to go about narrowing the bumper or is it just cut, weld, grind and then the usual chroming process?

Give some of the local custom bike builders a call,They will tell ya where the good chrome platers are in your area.

35fordcoupe: Sadly, industrial metal finishing is often not fully indexed in the Yellow Pages but if you go to "Superpages.com" on the internet and enter the city and subheading you will probably find a number of industrial sites. I know of two bumper plating sites in Richmond and another smaller shop that did some aluminum buffing buffing for me but you ought to be able to find a place closer to your home. I would note that bumpers are big and not all plating shops will have large tanks. Superpages.com in the Richmond area listed five shops, there should be more than that in Northern Virginia. Boy if I had a real steel early Ford I would revel in the nostalgia of the fact that it was there when.... but I have to use my imagination more with a 'glass '29 so enjoy the early Ford steel and just plan ahead before you cut anything. I am not sure of the actual lengths but I believe the stock 1937 Ford was a bit wider than the 1935 model so the bumper is probably wider on the 1937. Simple grinding should smooth over any trim cuts you may make. One last suggestion is to shop around and don't take the first estimate as final until you compare quotes from several shops and also try to find a welding shop that might save the bumper with brazing.

Don Shillady
Retired Scientist/teen rodder

I just had parts done at a shop here. i went for a tour to see how they finished the plating. and what i saw was belt sanders buffers and hand grinders. the owner told me that they dechrome the part clean it in a bath making sure the part was clean an depending on the metal what process they used. steal was ground down to 320 grit then they may even buff before they copper plate. the owner saying that the part would turn out however it looked going in but have a mirror finish. most places will not give you a set price but ballpark because of the labor and how good the piece is.
and the pits in metal all have to be filled one at a time so that is why it cost so much. the copper plating will fill the 320 grit marks then they can buff the copper to make it slick. they dipp it twice in the copper plating. before going to nickel then chrome. if you want his number. Rod was a super nice guy i'm sure he would be glad to answer any questions. jonathan