Chrome Plating
The original Volkswagen chroming is of very good quality, however many years of exposure to salted air on the Dutch islands does take its toll. All chrome parts were heavily pitted and corroded and far beyond a polish.
It is too bad that I don’t have any good photos of the chrome parts before the chrome plating, because that would really illustrate the brilliant job that was done on these parts.
Chrome plating is an expensive process and not really something you can do yourself in your shed unless you go out and buy yourself some “chrome” coloured spray paint. Needless to say, the result is not quite the same: so, start saving money by shopping at budget supermarkets, using newspapers for toilet paper and dining out at friends and parents…
My parts were chrome plated with a company in one of the Eastern European countries in an effort not having to take out a second mortgage. There is a risk of losing parts, as parts will have to be shipped back and forth and let’s just say things are just less organised in these countries. Even though everything did come back, I would have probably not taken the risk in hindsight. More recently I had some parts chrome plated at Metamorfose, a Dutch company, whom guaranteed that I would not see the day that a spec of rust will appear on their chrome work: seems like a tough one to test…