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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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Will Nickel plate to Tin? What about Lead?
April 7, 2010
I have been assigned to a jewelry project and am currently using tin to bond parts of copper to either brass or steel.
Will nickel plate onto tin(9X.X% - i.e. common soldering wire)?
Would lead be effective as a bonding agent during plating process(lower melting point yields easier assembly)?
And finally, what difficulties will be faced using electroplating (or other method - please expand) in plating nickel to a,b,and c as an assembled unit as follows:
a:copper
b: tin/lead
c:brass/steel ?
Thank You in advance
Process Engineer - Missouri
Yes, nickel can be plated over tin, tin-lead, and lead, but most job shops do not know how. Lead forms an insoluble salt with sulphates and chlorides, therefore, for perfect adhesion (not the naked eye stuff the job shops sell), you must remove surface oxides in fluoboric acid then (1) enter the nickel solution "hot", or better(2) flash in fluoboric copper or nickel to cover the lead, then with the lead sufficiently covered, go on into the bright sulphate nickel.
Robert H Probert
Robert H Probert Technical Services
Garner, North Carolina
April 9, 2010
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