Hi All

Any thoughts on how to best refinish a very old and classic chain ring from 1930s. No rust and nice and sharp points but could do with refinishing and / or possibly re-chroming. Given the chain will be running on this what are the best options. I dont want it looking over chromed like new but would like it to look a little less shabby. Is something with a nice matt finish an option.

See Image below.


Thanks

Arb

You could try scuffing with bronze wool & WD40, then chrome polish. If that doesn't give you the shine you want, you should be able to get a chrome shop to nickel plate it. Nickel will give you a subdued finish that's nice, but still vintage looking. A good shop will want to apply copper then nickel. The copper is used to fill imperfections, so the polished finish won't have any pits. The nickel plating step is the second of three layers used for a good chrome plating job anyway. They would just be skipping the third (final) chrome application.

Get a piece of aluminum foil. Crumple it up with the shiny side out. Now, rub a test area of the ring. If it looks good to you, rub the rest. I use aluminum foil all the time, on cleaning up chrome and the like. Works absolutely great...

It is a fairly ordinary 116bcd three pin ring. You can find NOS rings for $20. NOS on parts that old usually will include some patina. If it does not clean up well do not go to all the trouble of chrome plating. Even if you insist on demonstrable provenance from 1930s and a web pattern very close to what you have now this one should not be difficult to find. Try ebay.fr and ebay.nl.