Here we would like to help you to learn the most important things about electroplating.
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The Electroplating process is a method for coating (electro deposition) conductive (metal) objects by any other type of metal such as copper, nickel, gold, rhodium, chrome, silver, brass, bronze, tin, lead, zinc etc.
You will find this process very simple if you learn how to do it. The electroplating business is becoming more and more popular and there are many different ways in which you can become involved. Most types of electroplating processes are not expensive to set up (if we compare with other types of business) and it is very profitable as well. The Electroplating process is widely used in many industries such as jewellery, medical and electronic. This process is very suitable for the professional coating of many sorts of small car parts, decorators, craft workers and model makers’ projects as well.
First of all we have to acknowledge that in order to achieve experience and skills in this useful and exciting subject you will need to learn it and to get practice of course. This means that you need to be patient and, initially, spend some time on each new item, which you electroplate for the first time. And you will start achieving excellent results very soon and also you will be able to use that experience on future projects. We would like to recommend you to keep notes each time for the job you do because it will help you later on. Thickness and quality of coating is a complex combination of electric current, voltage, temperature of solution, time of exposure, quality of chemicals and your equipment and of your experience as well. Therefore, the more jobs you carry out, the more experience you will gain and you find the quality of improving and the time taken to carry out each project will be much quicker. In electroplating it is important to understand that lot of things depend on the material you are using, its form, size, quality, temperature, the solution used and the different times that different processes take. So, it is advisable to keep notes of all those things including the type of anode, the voltage, dimension between anode and cathode etc.
Three different types of electroplating process:
1. Tank plating process is the most popular and it is suitable for all types of plating processes. It produces a high quality and allows to plate many items at the same time. You can clean the item in the tank with the electro-cleaning solution and then rinse it. And then you can start plating them in a plating tank using heating and agitation options. Using this process you can plate the objects inside and outside as well. It is very quick (plating time usually takes 2-10 sec) but this process require some equipment such as plating machinery (rectifiers), tanks, anodes, cathode turning stands, heating and agitation systems. This equipment will be useful in the future because it allows you to do many additional processes such as electro cleaning, stripping, electro etching and electro painting. Just fill up these tanks with solutions, put objects which you want to plate in a cleaning tank, after that put it in a rinsing tank and finally put it in a tank with the plating solution. Switch your station ‘on’ (rectifier) and wait for few seconds (it depends on the process) and then you can take out your item fully plated.
2. The Brush Plating process is widely used to plate fixed items like kitchen taps, showers, tubes etc. It gives you a good quality of plated surface if you are experienced enough and if the object for this process was prepared properly. Unfortunately the chemicals for this process are more expensive because they are more concentrated and you cannot plate big areas by brush. And you can’t plate many objects at the same time as well. If we talking about the brush plating process you have to know that objects can be plated outside only. This process is fully suitable for Gold, Silver and Chrome plating.
3. The Pen plating process can be used to plate very small details, or individual small parts of a large object. For example, you can plate the fingernails or eyebrows on a bronze statue in silver. Pen plating is suitable for Gold, Rhodium and Silver plating only. It is fully suitable for any types of art works.
In simple terms all of the processes consist of allowing an electric current from a rectifier to flow through a solution between metallic or other conducting materials placed in the solution at the positive (anode) and negative (cathode) terminals of a direct current circuit. The current flow in the circuit results in the release of charged metal particles called "ions" into the solution. They pass from the positive terminal (anode). We refer to the object being plated as the "Cathode".
What will we need to think about to start any tank electroplating process?
To answer on this question we need to clarify first four questions:
1. Which process we are going to use - gold plating, chrome plating etc. We need to know this in order to get the right plating station with correct amperage/voltage. And we have to decide if we need an ‘Impulse’ option (required for hard plating processes) for the process that we going to use. Are we going to use heating or agitation system in the plating tank, which chemicals we will need, type of anodes etc?
Useful points on electroplating stations (rectifiers):
* Cathode Turning Stand - helps you to get a high quality of surface of the subject that you plating and helps you to save money (because of additional anodes). Also it saves your time as plating process goes much quicker.
* Agitation Systems (Air or Mechanical) - widely used to mix a solution inside a bath. It saves your time and it requires less solution as usual. * Heating system - allows you to get a high quality of surface (plating area) and saves your time on plating process. For example: if you try to plate copper ring in solution with room temperature - it may take few minutes. If you plate the ring in solution with temperature about 35-40 C - it will take 2-4 sec only. * Impulse option - widely used to prepare object's surface from carbonate or hard materials to electroplate. Usually looks like a button on front panel of rectifier and supplies your bath with high possible amperage for 20-30 seconds before start electroplating process. It is not suitable for electroforming. * Stripping option - allows you to change the polarity (positive and negative) in your bath without using hands - just turn the switch in right position.
2. How many items we want to plate at the same time? We need to know this in order to get the correct sized plating tank and anodes.
3. What is a maximum size of items we intend to plate? We need to know this to ensure that we have the correct sized plating tank, anodes and we have to make sure that the plating station is powerful enough.
4. Are we going to plate old or new objects? If we going to plate an old object we need to choose the right rectifier with stripping option because it takes off the old surface first.
The following is an example of the equipment and accessories required to plate a copper ring in gold.
The Electroplating station (rectifier) with 3 tanks for electro cleaning, rinsing and plating processes. As we mentioned before there should be an agitation and heating options in the plating tank.
If you plan to re-plate old objects - you will need one more tank for electro stripping solution and a rectifier (electroplating station) with a stripping option.
Gold plating/stripping anode.
Chemicals to make up the cleaning, stripping and plating solutions.
How to choose an amperage of rectifier:
Most beginners try to choose the right amperage of power supply (rectifier or plating station) for their work from size of plating tank or from its capacity. It is not the best way as you require much more powerful machine than you will need it in reality. There is just one way for this purpose - to choose the right power of your rectifier (plating station) from area of all plating objects that you are going to place in plating tank at the same time. For example if you have a tank 250 x 250 x 250 mm for gold plating process (that require minimum amperage just 0.1A per sq.inch) you will require a rectifier that will supply you amperage of 10A, but if you place in the tank just a few objects with plating area of 5 sq.inch you will require a rectifier of 0.5 A only. No matter - how big your tank is. Unfortunately we cannot use car batteries or other non-regulated power supplies and adaptors if we want to achieve a good quality. We must have a facility to regulate the voltage and amperage depending on the type of plating process (Gold, Chrome, Nickel etc), the type of object needs to be plated (round, square etc), and other factors such as the type of chemicals, quantity of objects, temperature of solution etc.
How to choose a right anode:
It depends on the material and the shape of the item that needs to be plated. These two things determine the anode and solution that you will require. The anode is the positive (‘+’) electrode, which is placed in the tank opposite the object that you are going to plate (cathode) which is the negative (‘-‘) electrode. Anodes should perfectly suit the item being plated so they must be chosen accordingly.
The main types of anodes for most popular processes are:
1. Copper anode for the copper plating process
2. Gold or stainless steel anode for the gold plating process
3. Silver or stainless steel anode for the silver plating process
4. Nickel anode for the nickel plating process
5. Rhodium anode for the rhodium plating process
6. Peroxide Lead Anode for the chrome plating process
It’s also necessary to choose the correct size of anode. It should be approximately twice the size of the cathodes (plating objects) and anode should be placed on two sides of the tank or (better) on all four sides. Also, if your item is not flat, then it may be necessary to shape the anode to suit the form of the object being plated. Of course, if you have a CRS (Cathode Rotating Stand) on your station - you do not need any special anodes or anodes in big quantity as the CRS allows you to plate any object in a high quality with one flat anode only. It will also help you to make your work much quicker and it will the solution that you use for this process. Please find any type and size of the CRS you may require in our E-shop ("Accessories").
There are 3 vital things that guarantees the success of the process that you are doing:
The plating process is only possible with the correct anode.
Size of anode MUST BE double bigger than area of objects that you are going to plate.
We may required a heating or/and an agitation system in a plating tank.
We hope that this information will help you to decide which equipment you need for your business. In any case we are highly recommending you to apply for our one- day Online or Face-To-Face electroplating course. Please feel free to contact us at any time regarding this matter on:
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