I have found this:
https://www.mcmaster.com/galvanizing-coatings/

works pretty well, along with the technique that Rick mentioned.

It's all a bit of a simulation until someone takes the time to setup a hot galvanizing process in their garage.

Mine on my F body sure look to be HDG. As well as the fuel line shield
Who makes the 2 letter paper stickers for the shields?

Don Lightfoot does them the best.

https://www.angelfire.com/rock/69ss/decals03.html

We owned a company that had 2 hot dip galvanizing lines. The process is the same today as it has always been. We galvanized iron pipe fittings and iron distribution hardware for the electricity grid. Much of this production has gone off shore due to environmental costs. Also, many formerly hot dipped products have been converted to zinc plating for cost savings (uses less zinc, cosmetically more appealing, but less protective). The grain structure of the hot dip finish is a function of solidification nucleation sites (pre plating treatment, bath temperature, and quench timing). Our company produced 250,000 pipe fittings per day, so the galvanizing lines were automated.

Never too old to learn. I don't remember a finish that looked galvanized on my DB backing plates. Granted, it has been almost two decades since I had them apart and plated.

I think everyone (including me) always assumed that zinc was correct. Through conversations here on this site by people way more knowledgeable than me we continue to learn more about these seemingly meaningless details. I am going through a process on my Chevelle now to "fix" many of the mistakes I made 20 and 30 years ago when I previously cleaned things up and either did not know any better or did not have the resources to do it correctly.

Yup...

I cleaned these ones up last fall and noticed they were galvanized. Not any longer. They are now zinc plated.

https://i.ibb.co/FqFZ3Vc/IMG-2352.jpg

https://i.ibb.co/7k4d3VJ/IMG-2355.jpg

Isnt galvanizing just dipping it in zinc when it’s hot? Looks diff I realize.

I certainly don't disagree that the some of the pics posted above appear to be galvanized with a small pattern spangle. Curiosity got the best of me so I pulled up the photos of mine when I cleaned them up with a low pressure bead blast. I see no galvanizing pattern whatsoever. I don't think I removed it during the blast process as I can still see where the original AD sticker was applied. Maybe the process was different from different suppliers or changed during the model run?

Time (meaning deterioration of the plating) and beadblasting "wipes out" the distinctive flake appearance on these. It all depends on how "weak" the galvanizing was before you worked on the shields. I've dealt with many many pairs of these with the original galvanizing. How much of the distinct flake pattern is left varies quite a bit.

We had a set of gas tank straps hot dip galvanized in Chicago a few years back....didn't turn out very nice and not even close to the small/"tight"/smooth flake pattern you see on the originals.

Will be interesting to see what results anyone gets.

I believe the process was the stamping places bought ROLLED SHEETS of galvanized steel and the parts were stamped out from that....not galvanized AFTER they were stamped out. The soft zinc aided in the stamping process...acted as a sort of "lubricant" and helped prevent some wear and tear to the tooling/dies.

I just looked closely at a pair of NOS Abody gas tank straps I have here....obvious scratching THROUGH the galvanized finish in areas where severe forming took place as well as the cut edges being shiny. Probably evidence of this on the disc shields where the spot welds are (done AFTER the galvanized sheet was stamped attach the center ring to the shield.

Lots of alternator fans exhibit the same properties.


R68GTO....that looks like a very tight flake pattern of galvanizing under the sticker.....it's sure not consistent enough to be regular zinc plating IMO.