How much does CopyCad look like real Cad?

[grandtouring]

I work at a restoration shop for old sports cars, and we have a small cadmium plating system set up here. We aren't particularly happy with the idea of working with the dangerous chemicals involved with cad plating, so we are looking for some alternatives. Because we build and restore many cars to compete in car shows, the aesthetic quality of our cad plating is more important than the corrosive protection it offers.

I just wanted to know what the Copy Cad plating looks like. Is it flat like real cad plating, or is it a little bright like zinc? We need to make sure that if we do go with a zinc substitute, that we can make it look exactly like cad. Thanks,

-Nick Turner

[seanc]

Nick:

I just wanted to know what the Copy Cad plating looks like. Is it flat like real cad plating, or is it a little bright like zinc?

I want to know the same thing, but from the other side of the coin.

I know what unbrightened zinc looks like, but not cad. Perhaps we can meet in the middle to figure it out.

I've taken some photos of test pieces, both brightened & unbrightened, and chromated / unchromated, they may give you an idea:

Zinc Finishes

I've also got some parts I'll be plating in the near future, going for the cad look. Will post photos when I've got them done.

Sean

[lcaswell]

It's a flat, dove grey color.

The Barber Vintage Motorsports Museum in Birmingham, AL has been using this system for their "cad" parts for over 10 years now.

[seanc]

Lance:

It's a flat, dove grey color.

Can you post a picture of a dove please?

I've never seen one going slow enough to tell what the color is!

Sean

[grandtouring]

Thanks for the feedback. On Seanc's website, the steel plate in the upper left hand corner (copycad with no brightener or chromate) looks like what we are shooting for. Here are some photos of a part that I plated with real cadmium yesterday. It is a brake booster housing from a vintage ferrari. I think that our cadmium solution has too much brightener in it though, because our parts always come out with more shine than they should. I took this piece, and blasted it with our plastic media blaster to get this finish. But this finish is exactly what we would like to duplicate with zinc.


(Note: In this first photo, the cad plate is not really as shiney as it looks. It just looks bright here because of the flash on the camera)





-Nick Turner

[grandtouring]

One other photo. This photo is a good representation of the actual brightness of the cad plate.

[seanc]

Nick:

Great photos! Now I know what a dove looks like.

With those as reference, I'm more motivated to get my parts done. By weekend at the latest, and I'll post the photos.

Another set of clear plated parts. In this case, commercial bolts stripped of the factory plating, and redone w/different finishes. The one on far right is unbrightened, and chromated using a non-irridescent clear: (click to enlarge)



It looks like my parts are "whiter" than your cad, but it's diffucult to make direct comparisons using our photos. Too much depends on lighting & exposures.

Sean

[grandtouring]

Well, I have very little experience with electroplating, and I'm not even 100% sure exactly what a cad plate finish is supposed to look like. All I know is that this is how the finish was on a lot of early Ferrari's. We are just trying to mimic the original look. From what I have been told though, this is close to what cad should look like.

I'm impressed with the photo you just posted. The bolt on the far right looks very similar to a flat Cad, considering that it has been chromated. We would love to use chromated parts if we could (for the extra durability), so maybe we will be able to figure something out where we can use the chromated zinc and still have it look like cad. Thanks for the photo again.

-Nick Turner

[seanc]

Nick:

Here's the first sample photos. 55 year old auto parts.

I plated both pieces w/out brightener additive in the electrolyte. The silver piece was nitric acid bright dipped after plating, the grey piece was not.

The second photo shows an original piece w/most of original cad plate remaining. You can see why I chose to bright dip the parts. (click photos to enlarge):



I will be putting more photos up on a web page later today. Will post the link when it's done.

Sean

[seanc]

Full set of photos now online:

Windshield Arm Restoration