ELECTROLESS NICKEL PLATING ON ABS PLASTIC BY USING ENVIRONMENTALLY FRIENDLY CHEMICALS

Abstract

In this study, electroless nickel (EN) plating onacrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS) engineering plastic by usingenvironmentally friendly chemicals were studied. Electroless plating is afundamental step in the metal plating on the plastic. This step makes theplastic conductive and makes it possible to a homogeneous and hard platingwithout using any hazardous and unfriendly chemical such as palladium, tin,etc. In the industry there are many distinct chemical materials both catalystsand activation solutions for the electroless bath which is one of the mostimportant parts of the process. In this study the effects of plating bathcompositions, plating time and sand paper size were investigated on electrolessnickel plating. Experiments were carried out with 400, 800, 1500 grit sandpaperby applying sand attrition process and at 75°C, 85°C, and 95°C bathtemperatures with 20, 40, 60 minutes of deposition time. The surface morphologyand the amount of deposit analysis were performed by Fischerscope X-Ray XDL-BSystem, X-ray Diffraction (XRD) and Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM). Due tothe results of experiments and analysis, the nickel plating on ABS plastic wassucceeded with two different bath compositions. According to the results, thebest plating on ABS plastic was obtained at maximum plating thickness as 2.47μm with plating time as 60 min and at 95°C plating bath temperature byusing 1500 grit sandpaper. Nickel plating was better with Bath 1 (6.2 μm) thanBath 2 (1.42 μm) on activated surfaces of ABS which were activated with 1500grit sandpaper.