[65 Cat 2+2]

My '63 Cat race car has a fiberglass front bumper, chrome painted. From 5' away you can't detect that it is not stock.
Unfortunately, the paint is failing in several spots after 5 years. In a search I found that the chrome-look paint is made by Alsa Corp., and there are other produxcts sold by Home Depot & Lowe's. Has anyone here had experience using any of these for automotive purposes? Are they DIY products or best left to a professional?
Any feedback would be appreciated.

[Keith Seymore]

My input would be "best left to a professional".

Any of the "self applied" stuff that I have tried ends up looking like argent paint.

The glass bumper on my Chevelle is painted argent silver with clear on top, which is passable.

The glass bumper on my engine builder's '65 is chrome applied to fiberglass. It looks fantastic but it took several tries to keep it from having a green/brown tint.

K

[Greg Reid]

I've used Alsa...it's ok but overpriced. For my dash I used an RC car product called Spaz Stix. You can get enough to paint that bumper for $25. How it holds up to weather, I can't say but on my dash it still looks like the day I did it. I used less than one half of an $8 bottle on this instrument panel.

[Gastiresandoil]

For plastic, I've used http://www.mmmetalizing.com/ for a few grille and under the hood accents on different cars. I has held up well, you will just have to ship the bumper to them.

[GpFreak]

Originally Posted by Greg Reid

I've used Alsa...it's ok but overpriced. For my dash I used an RC car product called Spaz Stix. You can get enough to paint that bumper for $25. How it holds up to weather, I can't say but on my dash it still looks like the day I did it. I used less than one half of an $8 bottle on this instrument panel.

Did you have top coat that with anything? Looks good.

[Greg Reid]

I did not top coat it. Some recommend a high gloss clear over it but I think it tends to make the appearance more like polished aluminum rather than chrome.
It's not 100% like chrome anyway but it's by far the closest 'do-it-yourself' option out there. You'll spend over $100 for the Alsa system. This was 8 bucks a bottle.

[1lemans]

i have a fibreglass bumper on my 68 lemans and had covered with a plastic wrap in chrome.Looks just like original chrome bumper.I'm in Australia don't know if you have that process available over there.Cheers Peter