Salvino's chrome

[TonyK]

Working on a Salvino's kit and noticed the chrome is very strong on the plastic meaning it doesn't come off. Scraping with a knife and sanding doesn't work very well. Eventually I manage to get a little off to apply glue but not always. Anyone figure out a trick removing it?

[yh70]

Have u tried EZ OFF Oven Cleaner name brand yellow can.. bleach works and total awesome u get from the dollar store. my self i like the oven cleaner..if it has not been clear coat over with a acrylic then it will work..if its been cover with a coat of acrylic oven cleaner or this super clean they brag about will not take it off.. these are for enamel paint only. now the bleach may cut thru the acrylic i never tested it as i spray enamels..only thing that i know for sure that would remove the acrylic is brake fluid. u own your own their

Edited May 1, 2021 by yh70

[yh70]

2 minutes ago, yh70 said:

Have u tried EZ OFF Oven Cleaner name brand yellow can.. bleach works and total awesome u get from the dollar store. my self i like the oven cleaner..if it has not been clear coat over with a acrylic then it will work..if its been cover with a coat of acrylic oven cleaner or this super clean they brag about will not take it off.. these are for enamel paint only. now the bleach may cut thru the acrylic i never tested it as i spray enamels..only thing that i know for sure that would remove the acrylic is brake fluid. u own your own their

i re-red your post. you are not trying to de-crome all the chrome just where the glue joins. scrape away unless u have a dremel tool .

[Mark]

I haven't bought any of the Salvino kits, but as I understand their plating is similar to Trumpeter's plating which is very different from the metallizing we get in AMT/Revell/Jo-Han kits.  The Salvino plating is harder to remove and impossible to strip.  Maybe use epoxy to attach their plated parts, that way you only need to get some "tooth" on the plating rather than remove it altogether.

[Deuces ll]

They actually use real chrome... Check it with a magnet... I think a coarse emery board might do the trick....

[TonyK]

Thanks for the help. Hadn't thought about using my Dremel but that would probably do it except some parts are so small they would probably fly off and never be found. I have used super glue since model glue isn't going to hold.

It's good looking chrome but hard to work with.

[peteski]

Yes, this example shows that using the same metalizing process as is used on 1:1 cars is not the best choice for plastic models.  Vacuum metalizing "chroming" using a thin layer of aluminum is much easier to work with.  That process is also likely be less expensive than what Salvino's or Trumpeter used.  Not sure why they went with the electroplating method.