Chromium is usually known as “Chrome”. It is one of the 91 naturally occurring chemical elements. Chrome is a metal, but it is not as much useful as a solid as pure substance this is the reason because of which the precision engineering company never use solid chrome. Rather, when you hear that something is “chrome”, this term actually means that there is a thin layer of chrome, a plating of chrome, on the object. The object usually chromed is steel, but occasionally aluminum, brass, copper, plastic, or stainless steel.
Most of the times people think that any shiny surface is chrome, for example brightly polished aluminum motorcycle parts, electro polished stainless steel boat rigging, vacuum metalized balloons and helmets, shiny painted wheels, and nickel plated oven racks etc, but in precision engineering these surfaces has nothing to do with chromium.
The properties due to which Chrome is popular in precision engineering services are as follows: the surface is more reflective (brighter), bluer (less pale, grayish, or yellowish), and more specular (the reflection is deeper, less distorted, more like a mirror) than other finishes. For experience, place one end of a measuring yard stick against a bright finish, and observe that how many inches of numbers you can clearly read in the reflection, one can even see the clouds in the sky reflected in chrome plating.
The quality of the chrome to reflect make it highly useful for the industry in a number of tools and techniques especially in finishing the products by electroless plating and chroming.
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