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Stainless steel electropolishing or nickel or chrome plating
Hi,
How can I get the mirror like finish using stainless steel 304 which I will use for furniture arm? I will use round stainless steel and have it bent based on the design.
our client showed us a sample that is polished SS and it was like mirror finish and they said it was polished. I was doubting that it was polished finish. I'm guessing it was nickel plated or chrome plated. Still I don't have any idea how to get their finish. I tried polishing the SS but I can't get that kind of mirror finish.
Please help.
Thanks.
production manager - Vietnam
March 15, 2009
March 20, 2009
Eric,
I've seen some SUS components that have been Electropolished ( EP
)that looks close to Nickel / Chrome finish.
- Penang, Malaysia
Electropolished 304 looks very much like chrome plated; and even to experienced platers, it can be very difficult to tell what is electropolished and what is nickel/chrome plated.
A dip in 30 % nitric acid will show the difference...
- Odense, Denmark
March 23, 2009
March 26, 2009
There is a possibility that EP can give you a finishing that looks like Ni/Cr plating. Apart from using EP, there is always an alternative which is mechanical Polish using polishing compound like green rouge and etc. However, mechanical polishing cannot polish easily on complicated parts or hard to reach corner of the shape.
To check whether the parts is SS or Ni-Cr Plated, I normally use a very simple magnet to check, but the base of the Ni-Cr plated parts must be steel :).
Good luck.
- Singapore
We have stainless steel fittings (T304SS, tees, crosses and elbows)can be mirror polish ID as well as OD to a chrome like mirror finish. From experience... this can be done without electropolishing. Also, customers using True #8 mirror finish sheets can weld and polish out the welds (semiconductor equipments) to a seamless joint. It's an art that requires experience and know how.
Michael Liu Taylor
specialty stainless steel distributor - Dallas, Texas
March 29, 2009
If you use #8 (mirror) finished stainless (other names are 600 polished, and lineal buffed tubing) to start out with it, all you will need to do is touch up the fab/weld marks after.
After fabbing you can have the parts electropolished which will increase the corrosion resistance, remove all weld/heat discoloration, polish and brighten in one step. And it will be cheaper than labour involved in mechanically polishing.
electropolishing shop - North Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
September 20, 2009
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