Hi Janet,
I was a little tentative about getting stuff galvanised at first-being in complete ignorance of the process - but I'm now sold.
Everything I've had done so far has been under 100kgs weight so gets minimum charge of about £100.00. Above that weight I think it's about 70p/kg ..But for that they collect it, and return it within 3 or 4 days normally. It'd cost me more to get something shotblasted.
And after galvanizing, paint is purely cosmetic and I don't have to obsess about it.
But you do have to be careful,
Firstly paint won't stick to freshly galvanized work - you have to either leave it to weather for a month or two, or more practically use a chemical to etch the surface a little(over here "T Wash is the popular stuff) This turns it a dull grey/ black, which will accept paint - also looks pretty good as a finish in itself, especially if you gently rub it here and there to bring up silvery hightlights.
Secondly any threaded components will probably need re tapping , maybe re drilling after galv. You may lose some fine detail, and have to file away the odd blob of zinc.
Any hollow sections in a piece must have adequate openings at either end to let zinc flood in and air vent out.
As they're basically dropping the piece into molten zinc
thin sheet can warp, and welding stresses can also come out to haunt you by making stuff twist and bend a little.
You got to degrease stuff thoroughly before it goes.
And lastly you got to hope the gorillas at the galvanizing yard don't run over it with a forklift truck.( happened to a friend of mine. Like just about everyone you pay to do a job, (except us!) they accept no liability for anything that goes wrong.)
BUT 9 times out of ten everything's fine, and mostly any minor problems I've had have been easily hammered out. And I know there's not going to be any rust problems for the forseeable future.
Galvanizing
Hi Janet,
I was a little tentative about getting stuff galvanised at first-being in complete ignorance of the process - but I'm now sold.
Everything I've had done so far has been under 100kgs weight so gets minimum charge of about £100.00. Above that weight I think it's about 70p/kg ..But for that they collect it, and return it within 3 or 4 days normally. It'd cost me more to get something shotblasted.
And after galvanizing, paint is purely cosmetic and I don't have to obsess about it.
But you do have to be careful,
Firstly paint won't stick to freshly galvanized work - you have to either leave it to weather for a month or two, or more practically use a chemical to etch the surface a little(over here "T Wash is the popular stuff) This turns it a dull grey/ black, which will accept paint - also looks pretty good as a finish in itself, especially if you gently rub it here and there to bring up silvery hightlights.
Secondly any threaded components will probably need re tapping , maybe re drilling after galv. You may lose some fine detail, and have to file away the odd blob of zinc.
Any hollow sections in a piece must have adequate openings at either end to let zinc flood in and air vent out.
As they're basically dropping the piece into molten zinc
thin sheet can warp, and welding stresses can also come out to haunt you by making stuff twist and bend a little.
You got to degrease stuff thoroughly before it goes.
And lastly you got to hope the gorillas at the galvanizing yard don't run over it with a forklift truck.( happened to a friend of mine. Like just about everyone you pay to do a job, (except us!) they accept no liability for anything that goes wrong.)
BUT 9 times out of ten everything's fine, and mostly any minor problems I've had have been easily hammered out. And I know there's not going to be any rust problems for the forseeable future.
Will Jones, www.ironwill.org.uk