Black Plating Gold Hardware

[glassmoon]

Hi all,

 

Not sure if this is the "right place" to post this, forgive me if it's not.... I play a Yamaha TRB6 and while the gold hardware is synonymous and somewhat expected with the TRB bass, I have always loved the black of Warwick Thumbs... so, with that in mind, (a) is it possible to black plate/etch/coat existing gold hardware, and if so, then (b) where in the UK (specifically London/Essex) can I get this done.

 

BTW - the hardware is top notch, hence me not wanting to shell out for new tuners and a bridge.  That may well be the only option - especially if the price to "change the colour" is stupid money.

 

Anyway - thank you in advance

[BassBunny]

Anything is possible but in this case the amount of work and cost may outweigh buying replacements.

The gold hardware is already played so I guess that would have to be removed first probably using a chemical dip of some sort. The tuners would have to be completely disassembled, which may not be possible. The bridge would have to be completely stripped down, as in both cases you only want to plate the parts that are currently gold. 

 

[glassmoon]

@BassBunny yeah, the labour involved will be me stripping things down, and yes, I might only be able to (for example) blacken the tuner "wings" - which would be OK I guess.  The bridge should be easy enough to do,... I just need to find somepne who does this and be able to chat to them.  I was thinking motorbike plating specialists - I guess they "clean" everything first to take things down to bare metal first as a matter of course.... not sure at all.

Time to look at parts as an option now I guess

[BassBunny]

If you look for companies that re-chrome items, they should be able to help as I guess you would be looking at black nickel plating and it would be a similar process.