"Chrome Strips" on 240Z Interior Door Panels

[lonetreesteve]

Does anyone know of a solution to repair those flaking chrome strips on the stock 240Z door panels?? My eighteen year old son and I are restoring two 240Zs, a '71 and a '72. The '72 originally had red interior, but we are changing it to black due to the short supply of red interior parts. We have found 4 original door panels in excellent condition, but 2 of them have a couple of small chips (or rips) on the chrome material. Your advice would be greatly appreciated!

Steve & Nick

'71 HLS30-25734 (orange w/matching engine#)

'72 HLS30-64733 (white w/matching engine #)

[CNIXZGO]

I had the exact same problem, I went to the local ACE hardware store and bought a roll of foil tape, sold next to the regular masking tapes, etc, also purchase a exacto knife to get a precise cut. Carefully measure what you need for the strip, then get a ruler and cut into one long strip. You can peel the backing off and carefully place it over the blue plastic strip. Might not be as shiny as the thin Nissan foil but it sure looks close to original. Good luck

Nick

[MikeW]

I also used metal tape but cut it into a 3/8" wide strip and put it on a piece of plexiglass in order to polish it with metal polish. I first used a board to support it but the wood grain appeared in the tape as I polished.

[Dans240z]

This stuff is flaking off on mine too. Is it purple/blue behind the chrome? Mine is for some reason.

How rare is the red interior?

[MikeW]

Is it purple/blue behind the chrome?

Yes, it's a dark blue almost clear plastic.

[zacny]

The best product I've used for this problem is called bare metal foil and it is available on line at bare-metal.com. Choose the ultra brite chrome as it is the best match for the door panels. The product is an ultra thin adhesive metal foil used primarily for model building. It's relatively easy to apply and burnish using an exacto knife and plastic/nylon burnish tool. Good Luck!

[MikeW]

The best product I've used for this problem is called bare metal foil and it is available on line at bare-metal.com. Choose the ultra brite chrome as it is the best match for the door panels. The product is an ultra thin adhesive metal foil used primarily for model building. It's relatively easy to apply and burnish using an exacto knife and plastic/nylon burnish tool. Good Luck!

From the web page it appears as though the product only comes in 6 x 11.75 inch sheets. Do you know if they have rolls or longer lengths? Perhaps it's so thin that you could overlap two sections without really noticing it. Sounds interesting.

[EScanlon]

The best product I've used for this problem is called bare metal foil and it is available on line at bare-metal.com. Choose the ultra brite chrome as it is the best match for the door panels. The product is an ultra thin adhesive metal foil used primarily for model building. It's relatively easy to apply and burnish using an exacto knife and plastic/nylon burnish tool. Good Luck!

I bought some of this, both in the shiny and the matte, and tried to use it to restore the choke console on my Series I console. Alas, it didn't live up to my expectations, possibly because I was using such a thin stripe of it. It is an excellent way of getting a nice chrome shine, but in my opinion it is too delicate for long term use on this part without some sort of protective shield on it.

If you're building a static display item, then it will probably look and last, but if you use your car at all, I would expect the first road-trip would shred it.

I'd like to propose something a little bit different that I'm going to look into.

For those of you who are into R/C or L/C airplanes, you're familiar with a product called Mono-Kote. For everyone else: This is a tough plastic film, with adhesive on the back that has exceptional shine and color. It is applied onto the wings and fuselage to provide a very lightweight but somewhat strong (it CAN be punctured and shredded) "skin" on the airplane.

This product has become available in a CHROME finish. My thoughts were to buy a roll of the Mono-Kote in Bright Chrome, cut appropriate widths and lengths from that roll and then apply onto the blue vinyl strip with the small detail iron that gets used to do stripes and other fillet cuts with the same material. The Mono-Kote does do a small amount of shrinkage, so form fitting it to the existing plastic would only be a matter of careful skill.

Hopefully (and I haven't yet seen a roll) the "chrome" on the foil would be good enough and bright enough to "duplicate" the trim.

2¢

Enrique

[Daniel]

The "foil on a roll' is HVAC tape. I used it for years.I placed it on the blue plastic and used the edge on a finger nail and slid it down the groove. I liked that best because it didnt take much to split the foil and I knew there was very little risk of cutting an otherwise good panel

[lonetreesteve]

Thanks for all the helpful information guys, I really appreciate it!

[bob m]

Thanks for the info on the chrome tape. I am looking for a solution myself and found a plastic chrome strip for the side of a car that is the correct width and is very durable. It also looks great. The problem is removing the blue base and attaching this instead. I don't want to ruin my panels but I pryed one edge of the fabric up to see how the blue strip was attached and could not see enough. Does anyone know how to remove the blue plastic? BTW I understand the base strip came in blue and another color, I believe white.

Bob M

[stevemasum]

For those of you who are into R/C or L/C airplanes, you're familiar with a product called Mono-Kote. For everyone else: This is a tough plastic film, with adhesive on the back that has exceptional shine and color. It is applied onto the wings and fuselage to provide a very lightweight but somewhat strong (it CAN be punctured and shredded) "skin" on the airplane.

Enrique,

It's been awhile since I've used Mono-Kote on an R/C airplane (must be about 25 years). I remember having to apply heat to the Mono-Kote to get it to stick to a surface. And when it did stick to a surface it would shrink. I'm thinking it might be hard to control the application of the Mono-Kote on the thin door panel strip. You might end up with air bubbles and a melted door strip.

Steve