Nickel De-plate Recommendation
- Thread starter Steely85
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I'm not an expert but in my limited experience, I've seen it done with sand blast, chemically (see Brownells) and reverse electro-plating.
Not that I'd recommend it as the preferred method but the sand blast did surprisingly well. I didn't use a blast cabinet, etc. just a blast gun (less than $20 at Harbor Freight) and a bag of fine masonry sand (less than $10 at most any building supply store) and did it outside in good sunlight. You do need heavy leather gloves (I used high-cuff welding), long sleeve shirt, mask or respirator (you don't want to breathe the mica dust) and face protection along with an adequate size compressor. I also wore a sock hat as the media will get everywhere. A regular sand blast hood would work, especially if going to do much blasting. I did plug the bore and cylinders and used caution on certain areas. I didn't do it but if you wanted to recycle the media, put a good size plastic tarp down and catch it. It seemed to work well on small jobs and was the cheapest method for me. Unless you already have access to a compressor, you may want to do the chemical. If you decide on electroplate, IMO, bumper shops do good on big parts but aren't so good dealing with smaller fitted parts for guns. They may remove the plating though without problems.
ETA:
There are numerous places that re-blue and can probably also remove the nickel. Fords comes to mind for bluing, but they may be backlogged on jobs.
Not that I'd recommend it as the preferred method but the sand blast did surprisingly well. I didn't use a blast cabinet, etc. just a blast gun (less than $20 at Harbor Freight) and a bag of fine masonry sand (less than $10 at most any building supply store) and did it outside in good sunlight. You do need heavy leather gloves (I used high-cuff welding), long sleeve shirt, mask or respirator (you don't want to breathe the mica dust) and face protection along with an adequate size compressor. I also wore a sock hat as the media will get everywhere. A regular sand blast hood would work, especially if going to do much blasting. I did plug the bore and cylinders and used caution on certain areas. I didn't do it but if you wanted to recycle the media, put a good size plastic tarp down and catch it. It seemed to work well on small jobs and was the cheapest method for me. Unless you already have access to a compressor, you may want to do the chemical. If you decide on electroplate, IMO, bumper shops do good on big parts but aren't so good dealing with smaller fitted parts for guns. They may remove the plating though without problems.
ETA:
There are numerous places that re-blue and can probably also remove the nickel. Fords comes to mind for bluing, but they may be backlogged on jobs.
Last edited:
usnrigger
Member
Fords gun refinishing in Florida, they will take care of the whole process
shovelwrench
Member
Fords does GREAT work... The wait will also be GREAT...
With that said, any place that does bluing and plating will be able to handle it.
The ONLY way you should sandblast the nickle off is if your looking for a matte/sandblast finish blue. Otherwise the expense of labor to polish out the sandblasting will be fairly expensive!!
With that said, any place that does bluing and plating will be able to handle it.
The ONLY way you should sandblast the nickle off is if your looking for a matte/sandblast finish blue. Otherwise the expense of labor to polish out the sandblasting will be fairly expensive!!
Good point that I failed to mention.
dfariswheel
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Along with Ford's these are some top professionals who can do it:
APW/Cogan, possibly the best of them all:
ACCURATE PLATING AND WEAPONRY 2016 | APWCOGAN
Welcome to TechPlate, Inc. Firearms retail plating price list
Elite Custom Plating -- Re-Finishing, Custom Work, Competition Guns
Hard Chrome Plating & Electroless Nickel Plating, Armalloy by Mahovsky's Metalife
Custom Gold & Silver Plating, Antique Finishing: Reliable Electroplating: Chartley, MA
APW/Cogan, possibly the best of them all:
ACCURATE PLATING AND WEAPONRY 2016 | APWCOGAN
Welcome to TechPlate, Inc. Firearms retail plating price list
Elite Custom Plating -- Re-Finishing, Custom Work, Competition Guns
Hard Chrome Plating & Electroless Nickel Plating, Armalloy by Mahovsky's Metalife
Custom Gold & Silver Plating, Antique Finishing: Reliable Electroplating: Chartley, MA
OlTimer
Member
Forget Sand Blasting. That is History, Soda Blasting both Powder, and Liquid is the way to go leave no marks on surface
Given the plating process, I'm not convinced that sand or soda blasting would work. Plating is done electrically, with the plating substance carrying one charge and the object to be plated a different charge. Electrons moving from the plating substance (gold, silver, chrome or nickle) carry atoms from that substance to the surface of the object to be plated. As long as the object to be plated it 100% clean, plating leaves a very durable coating. Case in point, the hard chrome used to plate the inside of gun barrels.
