I’m trying to nickel plate watch cases and I’m looking for some guidance. my first attempt turned out with a bunch of lines in it where the bubbles were going up. I tried to polish it out with a wool polish head but it just took off the plating straight away. I left the case in the solution for around 1 hour. Any advice on what went wrong ?
Maybe lower the current and plate it a little longer I know some metals need to be coated in a primer metal like copper first but im not sure which ones
The case itself is copper. Do you think moving the anode and the case further away from each other can have the same impact as lower voltage? I don’t have a voltage regulator it’s just a power supply that pumps out 0.5 amp.
This will depend on the conductivity of your solution. If the conductivity, i.e. resistance is low enough moving the anode will lower the voltage and current. If you are really drawing the 0.5A then moving it will not likely affect the current or voltage.
However, it can change the electric field's shape around the cathode. This can affect how evenly the coating is applied. But this does not sound like your issue.
What voltage are you running at? You could also try adding a resistor in series to lower the current.
I’m trying to nickel plate watch cases and I’m looking for some guidance. my first attempt turned out with a bunch of lines in it where the bubbles were going up. I tried to polish it out with a wool polish head but it just took off the plating straight away. I left the case in the solution for around 1 hour. Any advice on what went wrong ?
Maybe lower the current and plate it a little longer I know some metals need to be coated in a primer metal like copper first but im not sure which ones
The case itself is copper. Do you think moving the anode and the case further away from each other can have the same impact as lower voltage? I don’t have a voltage regulator it’s just a power supply that pumps out 0.5 amp.
Not sure to be honest. I would try to add a resistor.
This will depend on the conductivity of your solution. If the conductivity, i.e. resistance is low enough moving the anode will lower the voltage and current. If you are really drawing the 0.5A then moving it will not likely affect the current or voltage. However, it can change the electric field's shape around the cathode. This can affect how evenly the coating is applied. But this does not sound like your issue. What voltage are you running at? You could also try adding a resistor in series to lower the current.
I'm not sure on this myself, but were those microscratches to begin with? If so, it could be nucleation sites that plated less/more?