There are loads of articles about how to nickel and copper plate parts at home, this is my simplified reminder sheet.
Warnings
"Use Outside - The acid fumes promote rust"
"Well Ventilated - The electrolyte bath creates a fine mist"
"Poison - Do Not Drink"
Make Nickel Electrolyte
Although the ingredients are safe, the resulting nickel electrolyte solution is poisonous!
The electrolyte only needs to be made once and can be kept in a sealed container, almost indefinitely.
Requirements:
- Container - glass jar with a lid or sealable plastic tub.
- Power supply - 6V to 12V low current. Less than 1A is sufficient.
- Anode - pure nickel
- Cathode - pure nickel
- White Vinegar (distilled)
- Table salt (sodium chloride)
Process:
- Pour white vinegar into the container.
- Add about 1 small teaspoon of salt for each litre. Not too much. The salt increases the electrical current (reduces the resistance) through the liquid.
- Hook both bits of nickel over the lip of the jar, or suspend from copper wires, so some of the nickel is in the liquid. The two nickel nodes must not touch and should be as far apart as reasonably possible.
- Connect the positive to one bit of nickel and the negative to the other.
- Turn on the power. I used 9V which induced a 0.6A current.
- Bubbles should start to form on one of the bits of nickel.
- Leave for about two hours or until the liquid has turned an even shade of light green.
That liquid is the nickel electrolyte.
It's poisonous if consumed, so wash your hands and keep away from animals and children.
The solution starts to go green fairly soon after starting.
After a couple of hours the liquid is clearly green.
Nickel Plate Something
Requirements:
- The nickel electrolyte solution in a suitably sized container.
- Power supply - 1V to 3V low current. Less than 1A is sufficient. The lower the voltage the better the surface finish. The voltage does depend on the volume of liquid, but this is assuming it is for a small home setup.
- Pure nickel anode.
- The part to be plated is the cathode.
Clean the part:
The part to be plated must be completely free of grease and oxidation.
- Clean with soap and water, brake cleaning or isopropyl alcohol.
- For steel the part will need to have all of the rust and mill scale abraded off.
- Ideally any oxidation should be acid etched away. Using something like a hydrochloric acid solution or, I prefer, a slightly safer phosphoric acid based cleaner, such as T-wash (mordant solution). Any acid in the atmosphere will promote rust, so this step is best done outside.
- Rinse off in clean water.
Process:
- Suspend the nickel anode in the electrolyte solution.
- Suspend the part to be plated in the electrolyte solution on copper wire.
- The part and the anode must not touch and should be as far apart as reasonably possible.
- Connect the positive lead to the nickel anode.
- Connect the negative lead to the part.
- Turn on the power. I found 1.5V too low. I needed 3V to get an even coat in about 2 hours.
- Bubbles should start to form on the part.
- Monitor the results from time to time. Checking and turning the part. My sample took about 2 hours to get an even coverage.
At the end of that, the part should be evenly nickel plated.
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| Upper nickel plated, lower untreated steel |
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Additional Notes:
The power supply can be any source. A battery will work just as well for the plating, but a mains power supply is more practical for creating the electrolyte.
Sodium Bicarbonate neutralises hydrochloric and other acids.
Ceramic and concrete cleaners often contain phosphoric acid in concentrations suitable to etch the surface of steel.
According to some articles, the bubbles that form are hydrogen gas from the cathode part and oxygen from the nickel anode.
Reference:
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