Is anyone getting and excessively red/pink/or purple finish on their chromated parts? I’m working with a couple of amazing forum members to figure this out. I tried a new batch of chromate, more/less plating time/power, more/less time in the chromate, more/less brightener and nothing has worked yet. The results are consistent and I haven’t been able to "plate them out".

I’m performing charcoal filtration to remove any traces of organics as well as a .5 micron particulate filtration, in the hopes that it helps.

I did stop in at Lowe’s this afternoon and found some of their yellow chromated bolts to have a VERY reddish tint to the finish. Some were pretty green, too.

Also, the anodes I got from Caswell several years ago got very rough to the touch pretty soon after I started using them and relatively little smut was present. The anodes I bought in the past year have stayed smooth and there’s always a pretty good amount of smut present after plating. Makes me wonder if the anodes have changed in any way that would affect the final finish. I’ve come to learn that the presence of other metals, etc. can have a direct effect on the chromate color.

Your thoughts? Suggestions?