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Pulse Plating of Gold onto Stainless Steel

2000

Hello Folks,

I am considering using Pulse Plating for pure gold onto 316LS stainless steel. This I have never tried before and I am keen to learn if anyone has any pointers or useful advice in this regard? I wish to improve surface texture, porosity etc. Are there are specific pitfalls I should need to know about?

Thanks Sean

Sean O' Reilly
- Republic of Ireland

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2000

Sean We have done this many times. Of foremost importance is a good gold strike. An all chloride formulation that operates at pH 1 works well.

Pulsing the pure gold will make the thickness distribution slightly worse but will reduce porosity, reduce grain size, increase hardness and increase elongation. Good set of parameters to use is 3 msec on and 1 msec off. Let me know if you have any problems Pat

Pat Mentone
St Paul, Minnesota