Selective Gold Plating

A. Mr. Alfred,

Typical selective plating techniques used for electronics chassis include liquid masking (using a stop-off mask material )and tape masking (using platers tapes). Your plating chemistry supplier should be able to recommend the proper material based on the chemistries and temperatures you are using. They also may even supply certain liquid masking materials. Good luck, these processes take the steadiness, patience and talent of an artist.

A. I don't think your disability disenfranchises you from making money in that field, La. If you are an aggressive 'sales type' person with a history of successful sales, you'll probably do fine at it.

But if you're not, I think it will be a waste of an investment. In operating this Hotline for all these years, I don't think two people have asked me who they can call to get something gold plated with a gold plating kit machine. That doesn't mean there is no potential market, but it probably does mean that the world will not beat a path to your door.

A. Some of your terms are a little vague, Vinay. You have an "array of metal deposits" but you don't say what metal, or in what condition, or how they got there or why. You want to deposit "beads" of gold, but I don't know if they means you want to stick some microscopic gold balls on them that you have available, or you just need to cover the metal with gold, or what. The easiest way to answer you is to note that gold is noble to almost all other metals and will immersion deposit onto them from a gold plating solution. But I don't know if that's any help.

If you do want "beads", you could probably gold plate the surface then "cold weld" the beads. Good luck.

A. Vinay,
Try brush plating.
Good luck

A. Hi Shereen. There are two possible approaches: brush plating or masking.

You can search for "brush plating" and learn that in this technique you do not immerse the piece in a plating tank, but instead use an electrified "brush" or "tampon" periodically dipped into the gold plating solution.

"Masking" can be done many different ways: with plater's tape (quite similar to electrician's tape), with elastomer plugs or caps, with brushable glue-like masking materials, with waxes, etc. Good luck.

Regards,