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There were two seperate black chrome processes used on the GT's. They were both TRUE black chrome plating. A very deep, dark, lustrous black. Like a brand new highly polished shotgun barrel. The finsih also required much mantenance to keep it looking good. I'm not sure if GT sent special care instructions or not , but gun finish oil/polish seems to work the best.
The first ones were black chrome over a highly polished nickle or chrome plate (not sure which). These did chip and also had the rub through issues. But worse, these suffered from embrittlement caused by the plating process. These frame, forks bars and seat posts cracked easily and were re-called. I talked with a distributor here in the midwest that was alotted 15 frame, fork, bar, and seat post sets (all parts black chrome) for being one of the top dealers in the country. He re-acquired all he sold and sent them back. I have a frame un-cracked, but in need of resto.
The second ones were black chrome over raw polished tubing. These did not chip, but still had the rub through issue. since there was no plating under the black chrome, a thick scaly rust would develop quickly in the rubbed through areas. The finish required alot of maintenance to keep them looking rust free and lustrous. After plating these went through a "normalizing" process to relieve the embrittlement problems. I have a complete 1 owner survivor bike in absolutely stunningly mint cond.
The rub through problem was not too significant in either case, it took a pretty good amount (brake cable, pads) of contact to rub through.
The decals on all the black chrome parts I have are all: white base decal material with the black, red and yellow ink over the white. With the exception of the NORA CUP decal, which is the basic chrome one.
I'm not sure but I think the black chrome frames may be serial # batched, I would like to start a registry to see if this is true.
P.S. I am pretty sure the rumored run of black chrome GHP's sufferd from the same problems as the first GT's.
This post has been edited by Greg_Hanna: Dec 20 2007, 07:39 AM
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Dec 20 2007, 05:12 AM
