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Gold Plating Adhesion Problem on Nickel Plated Tungsten Material

2005

We are having some golden plating adhesion problem on a nickel plated surface on Tungsten.

A simple peel test with a normal office used adhesive tape shows that the gold is not adhesing well to the based nickel plating.

This is our specs :

Base material : Tungsten HD-17
Desired surface finshing : [Gold plate MIL-G-45204, Type 1, Grade C, Class 0] over [Electroless Nickel Plate MIL-C-26074 [on DLA], Class 2, Grade B

I think that tungsten material surface is slightly porous, would this be the root cause of the problem ?

Would anyone be able to advise what to look for in this sort of plating ?

Dylan Lim
Aerospace - Malaysia

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Dear Dylan,
Please see to it you do not waste time to plate gold on nickel. It should be a continues process :- only swills (water wash) in between. You may have a pre dip activator before gold under advise from the supplier depending up on what process of gold plating system you use.
Good luck

T.K. Mohan
plating process supplier - Mumbai, India
2005

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? Are you using nickel activator and acid gold strike before gold electroplate?

Hamilton Solidum
- Mays Landing, New Jersey, USA
2005

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Dear Sir,

We need to gold plate, tungsten wire, my question, can we do gold plating without any toxic material, like cyanide depositing on the plated material.

M.Vijaya Bhaskar
- Bangalore, Karnataka, INDIA
2005