ANODIZING EQUIPMENTS

You’ll find that during plating, the deposit is not very even, due to the throwing power of the bath. When a piece is set with the current too high, these areas are prone to burning as the majority of the current is accepted at high points, edges, points, areas closest to the anodes, etc… You can use robbers to absorb some of the deposit, so that overall the plate on the piece is more even, and help prevent burning. This isn’t readily apparent until one tries to sand or buff a copper plate, and the low current density (lcd) areas are quickly buffed/sanded through, whereas quite a bit of time can be spent on the high points, because the deposit built up thicker there. This also becomes unacceptable in respect to longer plating times, often encountered when a piece has pits/scratches in it, such as when more time is spent in the acid copper bath to build up more thickness to make the repair. When left in too long, too much builds up in high current density areas (HCD’s), and coral shaped deposits begin to grow. Robbers take away some of that deposit, instead of it all being focused on HCD areas.

Here’s a step by step pic of correcting this problem. every situation is different, this piece in particular seemed to provide a good example of HCD areas.

Usually I polish before placing an object in the bath, however in this case, being a relatively simple shape, without any deep recesses, it’d be obviously easier to buff copper than steel (the base metal). It’s been ground and sanded to remove and pitting/metal stretch marks, then sand blasted. I’ve already put the item in Flash Copper for 30 minutes. Flash Copper has excellent throwing power, and it’s purpose is just a strike coat, so current distribution/uneven build isn’t of great importance.

It may not seem too extreme in the photo (nickel for scale), but all the areas highlighted in red will attract most of the deposit. I can’t give you a percentage, but it’ll be enough to disturb how even the thickness of the deposit is, which also affects corrosion protection.

The piece is now ready for acid copper. The plating time will be longer, to build up enough thickness to be able to buff away the texture from sandblasting. It’s difficult to set up robbers without a rigid method of securing the item in the tank. In this case I used some scrap copper pipe, tapped a 1/4 x 20tpi hole in it, and bolted the piece right to it. The piece eventually gets a bolt covering this hole when it’s installed on the car. It’s okay in this case to fasten this way, as normally, this method will leave some "evidence" and be noticeable after the brighter subsequent baths. Directly behind the work piece, I bent a ‘U" shape in the robber wire, and when I tightened the piece down to the bar, it secured the robber wire at the same time. The object is to conform the robber wire near to the areas that will normally accept more deposit, so that it will limit the amount, in this case copper; that is deposited on the workpiece in that area. You can see how it’s secured and bent to shape in the photo. There are other ways to secure the wire, and other shapes can be made, but this is what works best for me.

The last photo is the piece secured in the tank. Often times I flatten and bend the end over (that is coming out of the tank) so it mates and rests on the pipe running across the tank. However, it can be very difficult to rinse the plating solution out of the tube without two open ends. A solid bar would be a better option, but more expensive.

Understand more.
-Jimmy

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Hi guys, I found this interesting powder coating technique that let’s you apply digital graphics to any 3d surface :
Powder Coated Graphics on Bike Frames – Core77

I tried to google for this and the only relevant information I found was this:
How do you do graphics powder coating?

Do any of you guys know any other information of it that could be shared?
(materials, what kind of printer, etc)
Any help would be really appreciated!

Okay, so a customer asked me to anodize a luxe for him (paintball gun).

Now, to my knowledge (and Luxe user manual), the eye lids are held on by a magnet inside of the body.
My friend asked me if I could mask them off with something during the anodizing process (which will protect the magnets, and protect my tanks!).

But is it possible? Has anyone had any jobs with Luxes, or any ideas on this one?

it feels so good to get a fresh sheet of platic on the blast cabinet glass. then after 15 seconds of blasting, there’s dust stuck it from the static electricity on the plastic. wiping it with a dry or wet or alcohol rag doesn’t help much, either. still staticy. so last week an idea popped into my head… "pledge furniture polish is supposed to repel dust." i gave it a shot, and its worked really well. haven’t had to reapply after doing some wheels and some other stuff.

I’m new to powder coating and have been trying some things and having some problems.

Background:
I built my own oven. I haven’t done a temp. calibration yet.
I have the Redline 250 gun.
I’ve added a ground wire from my spray rack to a ground rod outside my garage.

Successes:
Black on bare steel – looks great
Lollypop Purple on bare steel and bare aluminum – looks great

Failures:

1. Extreme chrome on bare steel and bare aluminum – color separates in places – See picture. Do I need thicker powder, lower temp, longer cook?
My oven has an old house oven temp controller – the powder says 392 for 30 – 60 minutes. I set the dial at very slightly under 400 and cooked for 35 minutes.

2. Illusion Amethyst and Illusion Aquamarine over black. I couldn’t get an even coat of powder to stick. Tried different settings on the gun, didn’t seem to matter

3. Lollypop Purple over Extreme chrome. Had the same problem with powder not sticking evenly. Tried with over Extreme chrome hot right out of curing oven – that’s the dark one. – seemed to get a more even coat of powder on, but then the chrome seemed to lift up and mix with the purple in the oven.
Tried it on Extreme Chrome cold. – very poor powder adherance and some lifting of the chrome into the purple in the oven as well. That’s the light colored one.

Hopefully the picture helps explain my situation. Please advise to what things I should do to correct my problems.

Thank you so much.

Spirit Flyer Creations

Daniel Gilbertson
Readstown, WI

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I’m having trouble finding the rope seal for my door. Any links?

Good evening folks. I am new to anodizing, but I have been anodizing sucessfully for the last few weeks. I have a customer looking for a similar color to candy apple red. I have Red Borderex (Spelling), but it is still too light. Can someone share any tips via message boards here or perhaps via pm. I have the color wheel, but it is only so useful in this scenario cause color on paper doesn’t look like color on aluminum.

Thanks!

I am having some trouble getting zinc plating going… I have 1000 ml of solution and attempted to plate a single bolt (10mm by about 2 inches) which had been sandblasted and cleaned. I originally tried 12V @ 1.5 amps but later tried 12V @ 600 milliamps with the same results. As soon as I apply power, the bolt starts to fizz and turn black. If I pull it out, it is like a slimy coating on the bolt. You can see here where I rubbed some of the coating off:

If I let it go for a few minutes, I end up with something like this (this was the wire it was hanging from)

Any idea what I am doing wrong? The solution is 1000 ml of distilled H2O with 120 g of Aluminum Chloride and 20 g of Zinc Chloride.

thanks,
Nuc

Hi, I hope I’m writing to the correct forum. I’m working on a silver plated serving tray that I’m trying to restore for a client. The top of the tray is an all over etched design. The back says it is silver over copper and you can see some of the copper base coming through. I’ve cleaned and degreased it. Did not buff it. After applying the silver plug ‘n plate the appearance of the central scrolled area has not changed – there is still a dull finish. Parts of it came out shiny around the rim. I thought maybe there was a varnish of some kind on it so I cleaned it with acetone, washed that off and then wiped it again with Zar. After that I went through the cleaning and degreasing process once again to make sure it was really clean. After another round of silver plug ‘n plate there was still no difference – the scrolled area is still dull and the copper shows through. There are some crystals at the bottom of the silver jar that I was using so I thought maybe the silver is too old? I plated a penny to check it and it came out OK. Does anyone have any recommendations about how I should replate this piece? Do I need to apply a copper flash prior to silvering? Thanks! Mary Rose

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I have this 1hp baldor motor..
http://www.motoragents.com/pdf/Baldor/VL1309.pdf

And would like to use it for buffing chrome parts. The shaft is keyed and 5/8 diameter.

Is the Extra Long Shaft Adapters the part I want and which thread? L hand?

Is a 8" diameter buffing wheel suggested for the 3450 rpm?

Thanks!