16mm mild steel shoe Buckle

Super Technical

For those of you who love the technical stuff…

Rolls of very high grade mild strip steel with very consistent thickness and width is lovingly loaded into an automated, multi-stage 80 ton press where forming and cutting tools and moulds bent, cut and shape the blanks into perfectly formed buckle bodies.

A matching steel wire section and fish-plate is shaped and attached to the buckle body and tumbled in an abrasive vibratory polisher to remove any burrs and sharp edges.

The completed raw buckles are then pickled in various acids and electro-cleaners, rinsed and a thick layer of copper applied through an electroplating process. The copper further rounds the edges and provides an excellent corrosion resistant base for the subsequent electroplating layers. In this case the last layer is pure copper which is deliberately ‘aged’ through a carefully controlled oxidation process. The buckles are then tumbled together and polished by leather strips until the ‘high spots’ lighten in colour to just the right amount. The oxidation and polishing process is paused forever by fully immersing the the buckles in a clear lacquer, centrifuging off the excess, spin dry and bake to a very hard and smooth finish offering a lifetime of maintenance-free protection. ‘Antique Copper Light’ Finish appears very similar to ‘Old Brass’ Finish as the oxidation is equally black and the underlying colours are very similar. Antique Copper Light has consistently been our most popular antiqued shoe buckle finish since the 1960’s. You can’t go too far wrong with this one if you require an aged finish.

Cast and finished locally and electroplated in-house we can make you small quantities quickly in a wide range of standard and custom metallic finishes to exactly suit your needs.