Dear Loren and mid-60s caretakers of our Buicks
"crown jewels,"As reported earlier, I sent my decent but weary OEM hood ornament to
Custom Metal Finishing Indiana. They arrived on Saturday, but I didn't have time to take a careful look until today -
WOW! Here is the before view of the front of the ornament as posted earlier:
Here is what the front of the ornament looks like now:
Sorry the photo is a little bit out of focus but the restored luster is obvious.
Here is the corresponding before view of the back:
Here is what the back looks like now!
Now the observant will immediately surmise that something rather important is missing - the Tri-Shield inserts that supposedly are impossible to remove. Well look here:
I don't know how the crew at Custom Metal Finishing Indiana managed to do it, but there are the inserts cleanly removed from the ornament undamaged!
So phase-II of this project is having the Tri-Shields painted. Loren, should I do anything to inserts before sending them to you? Does your airbrush artist needs them mounted back in the ornament to paint them or would it be easier to paint them before reassembly?
As my friend pointed out, the hood ornament is like the crown jewels of your car. Until now, it sure looked difficult to have a like new hood ornament. Well, that might have just changed!
I'm definitely extremely pleased!
Cheers, Edouard