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Ted Mooney, P.E. RET
Pine Beach, NJ
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for Metal Finishing since 1989
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Masking material for cadmium plating
Q. I am looking for a spray on (or dip) chemical maskant that will hold up to a cyanide based cadmium plate solution. It must be easily removed after Cd plating and be environmentally friendly.
Greg Haatajahelicopters - Fort Worth, Texas
1998
A. There is no maskant that is easily removed, easily a very debatable term. Environmentally friendly, probably none, but some are less damaging than others.
Tolber Div. of Pyramid Plastics, a division of Michigan Chrome and Chemical sells one of their stop-offs that is relatively peelable. They suggest using a spray application of super XP2000 which is fairly peelable on smooth surfaces, especially after a dip in very hot water. It is very slow to set and if you heat cure it at 140 °F it resembles a fully cured plastisol. They are in Hope, AR.
LDC in Cleveland sells a blue maskant that is fairly good and fairly peelable. It is not cheap. It is someone else's product. They may or may not tell you where you can buy it in bulk.
solvent removed maskants are anything but environmentally friendly and a lot of propellants in spray cans are not very friendly also. Large quantity disposal of spent pressure cans is a pain.
Wax is a possibility, but your cleaner has to go to a low temp one. Wax takes a developed technique to be good.
James Watts- Navarre, Florida
1998
1998
A. When I worked at General Dynamics many years ago in Abilene, we used cold wax maskant (dip and coat 2x) and then baked it at 140 °F for a minimum of one hour. After cooling completely it withstood darn near any type of plating, cadmium included. Easy to peel afterwards but not environmentally friendly. I seem to remember being kinda giddy around it.
Just a thought
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