Hello, I am new to electroplating and have been basically teaching myself in my spare time for a short while now. I started practicing on chrome plated drawer pulls I bought from the hardware store for a dollar each. After a few successful attempts I moved on to other projects and have finally started practicing on car parts. I am currently attempting to gold plate some chrome taillight bezels off a Cadillac. I stripped the chrome, the nickel finish looked brand new so no need for polish, and I went ahead with the gold. After I finished the first one I rinsed it good with distilled water. As I was drying it I pulled the gold right off it. I had read about this happening to other people but had never happened to me before in my earlier projects.I got discouraged and called it a day. The next day what gold was left on it was on very good so I decided I shouldn’t try to dry it off next time. I tried the second one for a fresh start. I rinsed it after I finished but left it on my work table wet. The next day it had huge areas of satin finish gold all over it. It looked etched or acid washed or something. It came back clean after removing the gold with metal polish, and I am now back to two nickel plated taillight bezels. I was going to try again today but this is becoming an expensive learning experience so I decided to ask for help here before I wasted more materials. What am I doing wrong?