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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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Nickel electroplating of aluminum
Q. I want to perform a nickel-electroplating on aluminium substrate, of such nature that can be mecanically worked (e.g. rolled, drawn), after plating. I tried with sulfamate bath without brightener, but the plating breaks during deformation. Can someone guide me in this respect.
wali Muhammadstudent - Reims, France
2004
A. Hi, cousin Wali. Most plating has some ductility, but not infinite ductility, and good adhesion but not perfect adhesion. When the substrate is aluminum, the situation is a bit trickier because there is an immersion zincate step in there (you did zincate and alkaline electroless nickel plate, or zincate and copper cyanide plate the aluminum before the sulfamate nickel plating, I hope). If you didn't zincate the aluminum, that's your answer.
What you might want to say to quantify your problem is something like: my plating is .00x" thick on .0xx" thick aluminum stock and I can bend the strip around a X" dia mandrel without peeling or breaking but I can't bend it around a Y" dia. mandrel without peeling.
Nickel sulfamate is one of the more malleable nickel platings, but some other metals like copper, tin, gold, and cadmium are probably softer.
Ted Mooney, P.E.
Striving to live Aloha
finishing.com - Pine Beach, New Jersey
2004
Q. I am using acid cleaning before double zincate process, I want to do nickel electroplating directly after double zincate process. The substrate that I am using is aluminium sheet 2 mm thick. When I try to bend it after plating it breaks in a brittle way.
Wali Muhammad- Reims, France
2004
A. Firstly ensure the aluminum is suitable for electroplating; some alloys really don't take to plating at all well. Secondly, make sure your nickel is chloride free; use either a sulphamate bath or one with nickel bromide or preferably, fluoride. The sulphamate nickel should give you a more ductile (relatively) deposit. I suppose you could use an electroless nickel, but I have no experience of that process. In any case, I would suspect it will not be very ductile.
Trevor Crichton
R&D practical scientist
Chesham, Bucks, UK
2004
A. Sorry, I have not heard of doing electrolytic nickel plating directly on zincate. My understanding is that this is because nickel plating is acid, and zincate almost instantly dissolves in acid.
Regards,
Ted Mooney, P.E.
Striving to live Aloha
finishing.com - Pine Beach, New Jersey
Q. thank you for sharing and want to supply me with informations about electroplating of aluminium substrate with nickel and nanosize composite electroplating technology.
Manal Hassanein- Cairo, ARE
October 4, 2010
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