Found myself at a loose end again, so rather than play games or something, I thought I'd be productive and get on with rechroming some worn trim on the Princess. This technique should be suitable for a wide range of interior bits and bobs.
I forget where I saw this done first, but someone had redone the badges on their VW and mentioned they'd used flashing tape. I think they were Spanish or Portugese or somewhere like that... anyway, that's not important, what is important is that I gave it a go myself and decided to share the results.
You will need a bit of trim that has worn silver/chrome on it, ideally something flat rather than something with compound curves.
You'll also need some of this tape. I searched on eBay for 'metal tape' and it came up with lots of results for people selling strips of it. No need to get a whole roll, the bit I bought that cost about £2 was far more than I needed. You'll get something like this in the post.
It has a paper backing and is very sticky. Be warned, if you work the tape too much it will tear, it's about the same thickness as kitchen foil, for all I know it could be kitchen foil with glue on the back.
The best technique I'm aware of for applying it is to peel some of the backing off and apply to the edge of what you're rechroming, rather like applying a plaster. Smooth the area you're working on a little at a time, don't get too hasty with it, and gradually peel the backing off.
Eventually, you'll have no backing on the tape and it will be smoothed to the high points (in this case) as wanted.
Then get a trusty craft knife, the sharper the better really and a pointed one for precision. You don't need to apply pressure, the sharpness of the knife will do the work for you. Carefully cut around the edges you want to.
Once you've done that, lift the excess tape from one corner and remove. It's quite sticky stuff, but if you've not pressed the excess down while you've been cutting it won't pose any difficulty. You should be left with nice crisp edges.
Looks and feels better than the original worn out paint.
I could do that square with one piece as the tape was wide enough - it comes in different widths - but the outer strip needed to be done in two halves. This requires a little more attention to detail as you've got to match the two pieces up. To start, apply the tape to one half as you did before.
If you can roll the tape around the edge, do, it's more secure and gives a tidier edge. The same applies if you're doing a much larger piece like a dash insert.
Once you've got one half secure and trimmed it all, you then need to line up your second strip precisely with the first. It can be fiddly, but if you peel enough backing off to secure one end and then the other, it is straightforward enough. Eventually, after you've smoothed it all out and got it where you want it, trimmed the excess off and smoothed all the edges you should have something like this.
Good as new!
It is worth noting that the plastic trim I used isn't the smoothest in the world so there are some minor dimples. The more work you put into making the surface smooth, the easier it'll be to get a perfect finish. Time will tell how hard wearing this solution is.
I forget where I saw this done first, but someone had redone the badges on their VW and mentioned they'd used flashing tape. I think they were Spanish or Portugese or somewhere like that... anyway, that's not important, what is important is that I gave it a go myself and decided to share the results.
You will need a bit of trim that has worn silver/chrome on it, ideally something flat rather than something with compound curves.
You'll also need some of this tape. I searched on eBay for 'metal tape' and it came up with lots of results for people selling strips of it. No need to get a whole roll, the bit I bought that cost about £2 was far more than I needed. You'll get something like this in the post.
It has a paper backing and is very sticky. Be warned, if you work the tape too much it will tear, it's about the same thickness as kitchen foil, for all I know it could be kitchen foil with glue on the back.
The best technique I'm aware of for applying it is to peel some of the backing off and apply to the edge of what you're rechroming, rather like applying a plaster. Smooth the area you're working on a little at a time, don't get too hasty with it, and gradually peel the backing off.
Eventually, you'll have no backing on the tape and it will be smoothed to the high points (in this case) as wanted.
Then get a trusty craft knife, the sharper the better really and a pointed one for precision. You don't need to apply pressure, the sharpness of the knife will do the work for you. Carefully cut around the edges you want to.
Once you've done that, lift the excess tape from one corner and remove. It's quite sticky stuff, but if you've not pressed the excess down while you've been cutting it won't pose any difficulty. You should be left with nice crisp edges.
Looks and feels better than the original worn out paint.
I could do that square with one piece as the tape was wide enough - it comes in different widths - but the outer strip needed to be done in two halves. This requires a little more attention to detail as you've got to match the two pieces up. To start, apply the tape to one half as you did before.
If you can roll the tape around the edge, do, it's more secure and gives a tidier edge. The same applies if you're doing a much larger piece like a dash insert.
Once you've got one half secure and trimmed it all, you then need to line up your second strip precisely with the first. It can be fiddly, but if you peel enough backing off to secure one end and then the other, it is straightforward enough. Eventually, after you've smoothed it all out and got it where you want it, trimmed the excess off and smoothed all the edges you should have something like this.
Good as new!
It is worth noting that the plastic trim I used isn't the smoothest in the world so there are some minor dimples. The more work you put into making the surface smooth, the easier it'll be to get a perfect finish. Time will tell how hard wearing this solution is.
