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Top: Business: Industrial_Goods_and_Services: Casting,_Molding,_Machining: Plating_and_Metal_Finishing

This category and its subcategories cover the wide range of services involved in giving metal and non metal surfaces, products, and components a protective, decorative, or, in some cases, specially required finish. It embraces a variety of plating, coating, polishing, and special purpose processes, the providers of which are indexed under whichever heading can be seen (or at least considered) to best reflect each company's business focus.

Note: There are some fine distinctions among the variety of plating, coating, and finishing processes and end results, with companies offering all (or most) of them or limiting themselves to some -- or even a single one -- of them. To best sort out the differences, sites are allocated in one of two ways. On the one hand, a company's obvious emphasis on one type of process (e.g. Anodizing or Chrome or Galvanizing) will put it into an appropriately specific category. On the other hand, a company that runs the gamut of several processes (as, in fact, the greater number of firms do) will place it in either this main category (to reflect involvement in both Plating and Coating, for example) or the main Plating one (in recognition that the capabilities are wide rather than narrow ranging).

Additional note: Coating sites more logically belong in the Surface_Treating category, as do, in many case, sites relating to Polishing. The rationale for such allocations rests on a judgement (however arbitrary it may be) that coating processes add a finish with little if any change in the physical properties of the underlying surfaces, whereas plating almost always changes them. In turn, polishing depends to a large degree on a machining (or sometimes a hand) operation and belongs under a Plating heading only if it takes some form of electromechanical or electrochemical deposition or alteration to the surface.

Anodizing

This category covers sites related to anodizing, an electrochemical process primarily applied to provide aluminum surfaces and products with a variety of protective finishes and properties.

Note: The category indexes both suppliers and users of anodizing chemicals and processing components provided they are the predominant business, manufacturing, or service feature. If anodizing is accompanied by involvement in other plating, coating, or finishing processes, the company's site will be found in whichever category best represents the overriding -- or diversified -- focus.

Chrome

Hard chrome is a popular form of plating and is usually available in a variety of thicknesses and for a wide range of surfaces and products.

Galvanizing

This category covers sites concerned with providing steel surfaces and products with a protective zinc coating, usually through a hot dip process.

Plating

This category covers the wide range of plating services designed to provide protection against corrosion, an increase in physical properties (such as hardness), and some kind of decorative finish to metal and nonmetal products. Both a variety of processes and end results are involved, and many companies concentrate on a limited number of them -- or even just one in particular -- while others offer a quite diversified list of capabilities. As far as possible, these differences are reflected in the allocation of sites to either this main category or those that recognize a predominant -- or even total -- focus on one given process rather than the others.

Note: Many plating companies also offer (wet) painting and (dry) powder coating services and, provided neither process is the major part of the business, can be justifiably included in this main category or one of its subcategories. Where, however, either painting or coating is the overriding service, a site will -- and should -- be more appropriately listed in the Business/Industries/Manufacturing/Casting,_Molding,_Machining/Surface_Treating category.

Additional note: Metal polishing is a further service that can be among a plating company's capabilities, but if this feature is the dominant one, the site more properly belongs in either the Polishing subcategory or the Bus/Ind/Mfg/CstMldgMchng/Surface_Treatment one -- with, once again, the recognizable business emphasis determining the particular allocation.

Polishing, Buffing and Grinding

This category covers the range of finishing obtained by such processes as grinding and buffing. Occasionally it follows the application of plating or coating to materials and components, but it is more usually -- and certainly for the purpose of this category -- seen as an alternative to them. Whatever the case, the process involves machining (or sometime hand work) rather than any form of dipping or other transformation of the original material condition and appearance. Note: It's perhaps a fine point, but the better allocation of many Polishing sites exists in the Surface_Treating category (see the "Machined_Finishing" link to it). The argument for this lies in further recognition that "a final polish" is simply the last step in removing roughness, burs, imperfections, and, of course, a dull appearance from a surface.

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