Auto Restoration 101

To get good chrome plating you usually need to disassemble the parts as much as possible. This is a 1951 Bentley Mark VI headlight bucket that I sent off to get plated. Before I sent it out I removed everything from the bucket. The small brackets for the headlight rings unscrewed so they were easy to take off. I also had to remove the lower mounting bracket. It was originally riveted in so I had to grind off the rivets on the inside of the bucket. I then made some threaded rivets out of some bolts. If you need more info on how to do this you need to look at this Hood Hinge Tech Article that I wrote. You can then send out the threaded rivets with the other parts to be plated.

When you re-assemble the pieces it appears that they are the original rivets. It makes the re-assembly very easy being able to screw the parts back together. It would be almost impossible to rivet the parts back together without damaging the plating.