I cleaned up 26 factory lugs for plating. What I found was that 2 of the 26 where chrome plated. The rest were clear zinc. Each of the bolts has the VW logo stamped on the bottom so I know they are factory not aftermarket. Were some of the early 73 bolts plated? I think I remember seeing some early on, then everything went to zinc. Has anyone else seen this?

.....Oh the wonder of Zinc (have seen it on other parts, as well)

Mark -

AFAIK all of the 70-76 MY OE alloy lugs were all zinc - but more of a semi-shiny finish, than some zinc plating that is almost chrome-like. They did sell black plastic lug caps back in the 74-76 MYs for some factory wheel set-ups IIRC.

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Porsche may have started to substitute the black oxide finished ones later - after 914 production ended - when they started using the black lugs on the 911/930 black 5-lug Fuchs, & selling those as a superceded part/part no.

There are two nailed topics at O&H with good pix for reference on this - one being the "Wheels & Tires" topic -

http://www.914world.com/bbs2/index.php?showtopic=74857

...& the other being The few, the rare...." one which featured Steve G's/smg's all original Sahara Biege `73 914-2.0 in the pic below.

http://www.914world.com/bbs2/index.php?showtopic=101921

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^-- The semi-shiny finish blends better with the correct OE "frosted" semi-shiny background finish on the wheels. --^

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Hope this helps!

where are you going to have them plated. I need to have mine done.