Chrome Plating: A Look at Advantages for Manufacturers

Perhaps you operate a small-scale metalworking company or maybe you own a manufacturing business that produces auto parts. Either way, you will spend a lot of your time working with various metals and metal finishes. Chrome plating, sometimes referred to as chromium plating, is a metalworking technique that involves following a process to apply a thin layer of chromium onto another metal surface. This electroplating technique is used across an array of different applications because it is so advantageous in form and function. Here is a look at some of the advantages of chrome plating for manufacturers. 

Chrome plating leaves you with a more aesthetically pleasing finish. 

Walk into an auto body shop and look around, and one of the first things you will notice is how attractive those flashy chromed parts are. The fact is, there is something so visually pleasing about a shiny chrome finish that chrome-plated items are popular in everything from auto parts to home fixtures. If you want to give customers a metal object that they enjoy looking at as much as using, adding a chrome-plated finish may be all that it takes. Chrome plating metals is an excellent way to completely alter the general appearance of a dull, metal object. 

Chrome plating is an excellent way of protecting metal surfaces from erosion and rust. 

When properly accomplished, chrome plating completely changes the surface of the metal it is applied to, leaving it more resilient to things like moisture, scrape and scuffs, and even erosion. This means that you can take an ordinary piece of metal that isn't all that capable of standing the test of time on its own and transform it into something completely reliable and worthy of many years of use. 

Chrome plating can be applied to many different types of metals through an easy process. 

Many manufacturers stay away from chrome plating because they feel it is a more complicated process than what it actually is to implement this process into their manufacturing endeavors. Chrome plating is a technique that really is not as complex as you would expect. The plating is applied at low temperatures, which means most metals take well to the chrome-plating process. So well, in fact, that chrome plating can be applied to everything from brass to steel and can even be applied to some forms of hard plastic for a metallic finish when it is needed.