The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Paint and Body Shop Chroming costs for 47-53 grill

Thinking about tearing my spare grill apart to have the horizontals re-chromed. Anyone gone out for bids recently? Maybe this will only be a dream after I hear the prices.

** Completely dis-assembled the grille on my 53 Suburban & had the cross bars chromed to the tune of $500. Had all the other grille parts sand blasted and powder coated high gloss black while waiting for the cross bars to be chromed. Reassembled with all stainless steel hardware. End results turned out really nice. The orig. grill was in near mint condition needing zero correction.

Hey Marzack, would you mind telling me where you got it done for that kinda price? I was just quoted in 450 for a single bar and about died.

I’m not far from you and it would be great to find someone in the area to do it.
Thanks

I have two local chromers to go to this next week for quotes. $450 per bar? Seriously?

Unless you’re trying for a show quality restoration I’d suggest buying a reproduction chrome grill. For about $425 you’ll get a fantastic looking new grill shipped right to your door, and no back and forth from a chrome shop. You can’t tell it’s not an original unless it’s out of the ruck and you have a magnifying glass. Much less hassle and a no brained in my opinion.

That's a good point to consider.

There's a powder coat "chrome" available. I saw a grille that was done that way and it looked pretty good. Probably not for show quality, but fine for a DD.

Finally took my spare grill to a local chromer who quoted $240 per bar. Hmmm a bit higher than what was budgeted. Since the grill on the truck is far less rusty with nicer chrome, maybe I'll just let this extra grill go to craigslist.

I have only heard horror stories about the repro grill so I am leery of spending that much to have it rust prematurely. That being said you normally don’t hear from the people that are happy with it.

I met a guy a couple of years ago who is a little older than me and has done a lot more restoration than I'll ever attempt. I always try to glean some knowledge from these guys whenever I get a chance. He told me he had used lots of reproduction chrome and had good luck with it. He said the secret is to paint the back side of the part and make sure you seal the edge of the chrome. The idea is that the parts usually start rusting on the back side and it creeps under the chrome at the edges. I don't have enough experience to say that it works but I've painted the backside of my chrome parts just in case. I can't see how it could hurt.