blurguy

Re: Difference between Nickel Sulphate, Nickel Chloride, Nickel Sulfamate, Nickel Bromide

Hi Guys,

I am new into nickel electrolytic platiing. Could anyone enlighten me on why is there such a wide different range of nickel salts used for nickel electrolytic plating.

What are the mechanical and electrical properties of the plated nickel?

Thanks Alot

DustinGebhardt

Re: Difference between Nickel Sulphate, Nickel Chloride, Nickel Sulfamate, Nickel Bromide

The different nickel salts each plays a different role in a plating bath.  Depending upon the type of bath, you will use certain liquid salts.  A Woods Strike bath is very different than a Watts bright bath. 

nickel sulfate: provides Ni ions.  The sulfate is mostly inert.

nickel chloride: provides nickel ions.  The chloride ion helps with anode corrosion and brightness/leveling ability. Too high a chloride concentration and your ductility will be compromised.

nickel sulfamate: similar to Ni sulfate, except that sulfamate is added to the bath in place of the sulfate. Sulfamic acid has some different properties that sulfate, but I can't exactly remember right now.

nickel bromide: I've never seen this.

nickel carbonate: supplies Ni ions.  The carbonate is used to raise pH (albeit very slowly and messy) without affect chemistry too much.

And what type of information are you looking for regarding the deposited nickel?

-Dustin Gebhardt,
CEF
Plating Engineer
Danaher Tool Group
Gastonia, NC

DaveO

Re: Difference between Nickel Sulphate, Nickel Chloride, Nickel Sulfamate, Nickel Bromide

Dustin has pretty well summed up the reasons for Nickel Sulfate and Nickel Chloride. They are components in the Watts bath. Nickel Chloride is also used in a formulation called a Woods Nickel strike which is used to activate stainless steel alloys for subsequent electroplating.
Nickel Sulfamate and Nickel Bromide are used in baths which employ high current densities, and fast build-up such as used in reel-to-reel plating, high build-up baths such as those employed in electroforming and baths to repair aircraft parts, where a high-ductility, low stress deposit is required for final machining. The Nickel Bromide is used as an anode corrosion promoter in a sulfamate bath, by the way, Dustin.
Blurguy, you need to get yourself to an Electroplating school such as those sponsored by many NASF Branches or to one of the commercial ones offered, then things will not be so "Blurred".

Dedalus

Re: Difference between Nickel Sulphate, Nickel Chloride, Nickel Sulfamate, Nickel Bromide

My understanding is that Ni sulfamate gives a much lower stress deposit than Ni sulfate; hence its use in electroforming applications. High chlorides do indeed lead to bad ductility - platers that I knew that were very rigorous about controlling Cl (not using HCl for pH adjustments, watching drag-in from HCl pickle rinses/baths) had far better deposit stress.

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