Want parts duplicated in resinl; who to have do this?

[Hawk312]

I would like to make copies of the Rallye wheels that came with my Camaro kits, but would like to avoid the expense of a casting set. Is there a resin company that anyone prefers that would be willing to undertake this? I can give them a sample wheel to copy from. I would also like to have it chromed if possible.
Sorry if this is a dumb question....I dont have much experience with this.

[Hawk312]

Anyone?

[Sixx]

Well, I'll give this one my best shot.

For the wheels, you could contact Chris Plum of Scalemodelingbychris, he is out of Michigan and he would be the first one I contacted. he's a great guy who is really great to his customers. He has one hell of a hobby store and he's a great builder!

you can try Jimmy Flintstone at jimmyflintstonestudios.com
possibly R&R which is resinrealm.com
or Replicas and minatures of Maryland, they don't have a website but you can get their address from Scale auto mag. you'd have to contact them by mail.

As far as the chroming goes, there's a company called Chromtech USA and they will do the chroming for you!
I hope I helped you out! good luck man!

[Sixx]

the website for chrometech is www.chrometechusa.com

[CFarias]

You may find that having someone reproduce a single set of whels may be more expensive than investing in a casting kit which could produce many more sets.

If you can cast the wheels as one-piece molds then its pretty easy to do. Using a thin amount of super glue, attach a wheel to some plastic sheet. Form a fence around the part about 1/2-inch around and above the part with the sheet on the bottom. Spray the wheel with a very light coat of cooking spray. Brush the part with RTV then pour the rest of RTV into the mold until its filled to the top. I like using slow setting RTV as it gives a lot of time for air bubbles to escape before it hardens. After it hardens carefully pull the part out -- the cooking spray will make it easier. You can recover the original wheel from the plastic sheet by putting it in a bath of SuperClean for a couple of days, it will weaken the super glue.

Now clean the mold with dishwashing detergent and, when bone dry, spray another light coat of cooking spray into the mold. Then, pour your resin mix into the mold. I like using a slow setting resin here too for the same reason mentioned before and it makes for a stronger part. Pour to just about the height of the mold. When hardened carefully full the part out and trim out excess resin and you should have a finished piece.

That's it, now you can make a bunch. The cost of resin per part is pretty cheap so make more than you need in case you break any.

If you have to do a two part mold it's only slightly more complicated.

Resin and RTV can be purchased in smaller, cheaper, sample amounts. Some companies may even provide free samples. So give it a try.

As far as chroming goes visit this site,

http://www.chrometechusa.com/modelplate.html

They have been chroming model parts for years. Also I've had good results using the Aclad II system, but I've never tried it an parts larger than 1/24.