020 8500 2500 Monday to Friday, 8:30 to 17:00 Drawings and tender packs: drawings@prolinesales.co.uk
PROLINEArchitectural Ironmongers

It is usually worth saving

On a refurbishment, and particularly on a listed or a period building, the existing hardware is better than anything currently made. Electroplating puts new metal onto the item you already own, so the original survives with a new surface on it.

Making the knobs hollow kept the doors inside the hardware already scheduled for them.

Oversized solid bronze adds mass to the leaf, and added mass changes the hinge grade and the closer power size. That only gets caught when the person making the knob is also the person writing the schedule.

Bespoke centre door knobs, care home development, bronzed to match the doorsets.

How a knob is bronzed

Five steps, in full
  1. Strip. Existing lacquer taken off with chemicals and a polishing mop.
  2. Degrease. Dipped in a commercial detergent.
  3. Bronze. Immersed in a water based solution and worked continuously until the colour comes up.
  4. Seal. Cleaned with a mild detergent and sealed with a bronze sealer.
  5. Age. By a rubbing technique, where the client wants it.

Re-chroming and lock repair

Bath handles, rim locks
A polished brass rim lock with an engine turned face plate and a matching keep

Electroplating puts new metal onto the item you already own, so the original survives with a new surface on it. These bath handles were a shape nobody makes now. Rim locks are the same argument: stripped, repaired and refinished rather than replaced.

Collected and delivered the bath handles to site. Really good finish and fast turnaround on these. Definitely a company to use on any other bath handles or products we need re-chroming on the project.

Jack EdwardsHutton Construction

Matt black, powder coated to a fire door

Commercial package

Coating hardware to match a doorset is a finish decision and a compliance decision at once. Black furniture on a dark leaf can fail the 15 point LRV contrast guidance, and on a fire door the coating has to be one the hardware was tested with. Both are solvable. Neither solves itself.

Large brushed metal numerals reading 28 and 29 fixed to a dark green corridor wall above door openings
Numerals and wayfinding, cut and fixed Engraved, cut and fixed to a client specification Contrast and signage

Send us a photograph and we will tell you whether it is worth saving.

Most of what arrives here can be stripped, repaired and replated for less than replacement. Where it cannot, we will say so and price the closest match instead.

Monday to Friday, 8:30 to 17:00. Or forward the whole email thread to drawings@prolinesales.co.uk.

Call Send drawings