Metal finishing Q&As since 1989

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Need Precision Matte Black E-Coat

We are a manufacturer of microphones. Most of our products are brass, with nickel or black chrome plating and over the years we have found some excellent platers to work with. But we have some new models that will use aluminum housings and we are looking at matte or semi-matte e-coat instead of black chrome. These are high value parts and several previous attempts with powder coating were not too successful; coating thickness was uneven. In general we like the color of hard anodizing but this finish is also too variable, and regular black anodize is too susceptible to scratching. Another option we would consider is Nextel suede, or something maybe a little less matte than that. It needs to be very scratch-resistant.

David Josephson
manufacturing electronics - Santa Cruz, California, USA
October 1, 2008