Electroless Nickel Plating

I just ordered their kit this week. From what I could find, if you do the proper preparation it works great. These kits are very popular with guys restoring old bikes. If you google it you well find a lot of info.
 
Thanks, are you going to use it for a bike or plate some gun parts. I'm real interested in this so if you don't mind keep me posted on how it works out.
 
Maybe both. Revolver well be the first project.
The good riding weather is just about here, I'm not taking any parts off my bike. As slow as I work I would not get out till July. I saw one guy that had nickle plated the heads on a old 80 inch flat head Harley. Looked great and was holding up to the heat. It was a satin finish with just the cooling fins polished.
 
I saw one guy that had nickle plated the heads on a old 80 inch flat head Harley. Looked great and was holding up to the heat. It was a satin finish with just the cooling fins polished.
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Those old flatheads can run pretty hot so it must be a pretty good process, I had a Colt combat comander 45 that had electroless nickle finish from the Colt Custom shop and it held up great, had a nice semi gray look to it.
 
We used to electroless nickel plate the thrust chambers on the Orbital maneuvering Subsystem Engines on the Shuttle. It took 6 months from the time we sent them to Reno until they came back. The nickel was about .390 deep. Cost was astronomical.
 
We used to electroless nickel plate the thrust chambers on the Orbital maneuvering Subsystem Engines on the Shuttle. It took 6 months from the time we sent them to Reno until they came back. The nickel was about .390 deep. Cost was astronomical.
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That is thick. These kits deposit .001 in about one hour. The cost is about $1 per square inch @.001.
 
if your trying to hide that brass frame try tinning it. I have used tin solder over a 49 brass colt frame and it came out very nice looks more like a SS gun.
 
if your trying to hide that brass frame try tinning it. I have used tin solder over a 49 brass colt frame and it came out very nice looks more like a SS gun.
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I never thought of that, good idea. You would need to be good at soldering to get a nice even layer. I assume you heat the frame and apply direct to the frame, no iron involved other than to pick up excess solder.
 
if your trying to hide that brass frame try tinning it. I have used tin solder over a 49 brass colt frame and it came out very nice looks more like a SS gun
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Not trying to hide a brass frame, got an old steel frame navy and thought the electroless nickel would look good.
 
"Electroless" isn't a description of appearance, it's the method by which the plating process occurs. Electroless can be shiny or matte, just as can electroplating.
 
"Electroless" isn't a description of appearance, it's the method by which the plating process occurs. Electroless can be shiny or matte, just as can electroplating.
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Yes sir. The appearance is effected by the preparation prior to the plating process.
 
I'm interested in this. Anyone interested in making a whitepaper write up for us noobs?

I'd be interested but I have no experience doing anything like this. I'd be willing to try (and be extremely appreciative) though if someone went through the effort during the process and photographed and recorded each step.
 
I finally got a tracking # from Caswell, so I should have my kit the middle of next week, barring floods or nuclear war.
I well take some photos and post up what I think of this 'kit'.
 
For the benefit of others, I'll mention that it's actually quite simple to silver plate the brass backstrap and trigger guard of a reproduction revolver to give it the look of an original.
It's a liquid named Silver Brite that bonds to brass, copper and bronze without needing electricity or a plating tank.
The surface only needs to be prepared and then the liquid applied.
The plating that results is ultra thin but it's shiney and easy to touch up.
A fellow on another forum applied it to all of his revolvers to make them look like original Colts and the results were beautiful.
The cost of the liquid plating solution is only a fraction of having thick silver plating applied to all of his guns, which was priced at $50 to have just one of them done locally. The bottle easily contains enough solution to plate over a dozen revolvers.
He recommended to simply buy the refill bottle of solution and not the kit and to apply it with cotton balls or cloth.

The refill kit with 4 oz. of the solution is $19.95:

http://www.metalbrite.net/page/848836
 
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The original Silver Brite is no longer made. I have tried the new formula and it does not work at all. I have bought a lot of metalbrite products and all have been first class. When I e-mailed about the poor performance of the silver brite they responded that the new formula does not work and offered a full refund (good customer service). Apparently they have used three different manufacturers for this product and only the first manufacturer got it right, and that manufacture is no longer producing the product.
 
That's too bad.
IIRC, the other fellow reported about doing his approx. 6 - 9 months ago.
Maybe he used old stock.
Hopefully they'll eventually be able to make it right again.
Thanks for the update.
 
I bought a bottle of it based upon recs here. It works, but it's a LOT of effort - it has to be buffed on, you can't just wipe on/wipe off. There's no way you can get to the nooks and crannies inside a triggerguard with it.

It would probably be fine on silver serving ware, etc....flat surfaces.

EDIT...

...this thread got me thinking, maybe I should give another try.

So I got out my 1860, and tried a little on the triggerguard - went on really easy, looked great. I took the guard off and went after the visible surfaces, and...hey presto!

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Didn't take any real pressure or force, I did the tight spots with Q-tips. I suspect it won't stand a lot of handling - probably best for display pieces - but I do like it.

My problem in the past seems to be...this stuff doesn't like highly polished surfaces. The piece I tried it on before (Remington TG) had been cleaned and polished prior; the Colt was clean but the brass had lots of stains, etc. Go figure.
 
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Thanks. This episode is proof that 'operator error' affects us all...


BTW, my bottle is only a couple weeks old, so the stuff they're selling now appears to do the job.
 
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