We use a display cooler to sell strawberries and apple cider. Looks about like what you'd see for a small milk cooler in a store.
The shelves are made of small rods or heavy wire. They are beginning to show their age with slight rusting and the original chrome wearing off.
Would these be a good candidate for nickel chroming at home? How should I prep (remove the rust)them?
Karl
Could be done, but probably more trouble than it's worth. You must strip the chrome, which will also probably remove any rust. Then you must neutralize, rinse, and polish if you want a mirror finish. Then clean again and plate with copper, then nickle-plate.
Maybe I'm oversimplifying. I thought the electroless nickel went on as the only layer. Not after shiny here, just rust prevention. The SO wants to just paint them. I'm afraid the paint will just come right off as product is slid in/out.
Any other suggestions?
Karl
You are right, electroless nickel does go on in one layer. However, I think you need to strip them down to bare steel for the nickel to work right. The chrome can be stripped at home or at a plating shop. The cost of the chemicals and equipment to strip and replate with nickel in a home shop probably exceeds the cost of just letting a chrome shop replate them. If you decide to try it at home, Brownells
Randy
"Karl Townsend" wrote in message news:FIcXf.9703$ snipped-for-privacy@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net...
--Probably cheaper to get new ones at Costco; saw some on sale the last time I was there..
Greetings Karl, I have used products from Caswell in the past and have had good results. They will answer all your questions. They have always answered mine with helpful answers. They are geared towards the small user and the novice. If you paint the racks I wonder how well the paint will stick to the chrome? It would be pretty hard to sand all those small diameters. Some epoxy paints are very durable and if epoxy paint sticks it will probably last a long time. Cheers, eric
They are probably cadmium plated.
Why would you assume that? It's pretty easy to see the difference between chrome and cadmium plate, and unless this cooler is very old there's very little chance the racks are cad plated.
If this is just a few small shelves, I'd be inclined to make new ones from SS rod and wire. A proper spot welder would be nice, but for a reasonable number of shelves TIGing the joints wouldn't take long. I've got some 1/8" wire set aside to make a new cooking grill for our fire pit, and the lack of a real mud season here in NE this year means I need to get on it soon.
Ned Simmons
If it's old enough the plating's coming off it could be cadmium plated. What year did they stop using it? Karl
Not if it was for food service. Aside from cadmium being toxic, both cadmium and zinc are readily attacked by even mild food acids -- like those found in fruit juice, soft drinks or catsup. It was undoubtedly chrome.
Didn't really think of food service. Our coolers are for beer and soda. They look to be zinc plated to me. A lot of our products sit on plastic racks on the wire racks. The cooler was used when we got it. Karl
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