Replating Stainless Steel Yellow

[Ray716]

Has anyone been successful at replating Stainless Steel with a yellow plate? If so, what did you do?

 

Thanks for your time.

[Geo]

Welcome to the forum Ray. Have you considered PVD coating?

https://www.pvd-coatings.co.uk/

[cdjswiss]

One way of coating SS with gold is by vacuum evaporation of a little gold wire from a tungsten filament. As gold doesn't oxidise the vacuum does not have to be too good. I have done this many times during my professional activities but it it also well within the reach of a competent amateur. The SS must be heated for good results. Gold alloys are evaporated in this way to give harder wearing surfaces of the correct colour. Another technique called sputtering is less amenable to amateur work.

 

Gold electroplating is also possible - Google 'gold plated stainless steel' for some U-tube and other examples. I have used the plating solution from

goldn.co.uk/msds.htm

The only special requirement is the anode - I employed a length of gold wire wrapped with cotton wool but the plating suppliers offer alternative anodes. However, the plated layer is 22ct gold - not the colour of the lower alloys (9ct and 18ct ) and very soft thus wearing rapidly. It is of little practical use for anything other than an ornament that does not suffer wear and in this case (e.g. a clock case) the classic gold foil applied with gold size is the appropriate method.

Edited October 10, 2015 by cdjswiss

[rogart63]

One way of coating SS with gold is by vacuum evaporation of a little gold wire from a tungsten filament. As gold doesn't oxidise the vacuum does not have to be too good. I have done this many times during my professional activities but it it also well within the reach of a competent amateur. The SS must be heated for good results. Gold alloys are evaporated in this way to give harder wearing surfaces of the correct colour. Another technique called sputtering is less amenable to amateur work.

 

Gold electroplating is also possible - Google 'gold plated stainless steel' for some U-tube and other examples. I have used the plating solution from

goldn.co.uk/msds.htm

The only special requirement is the anode - I employed a length of gold wire wrapped with cotton wool but the plating suppliers offer alternative anodes. However, the plated layer is 22ct gold - not the colour of the lower alloys (9ct and 18ct ) and very soft thus wearing rapidly. It is of little practical use for anything other than an ornament that does not suffer wear and in this case (e.g. a clock case) the classic gold foil applied with gold size is the appropriate method.

Interesting tell me more about the vacuum plating . Do you now if there is a video or somewhere you can read more about it ? 

[Ray716]

Hmm.. I'm not sure either will work with the limited resourses we have.. I was hoping someone knew what type of "Yellow plate" solution worked best for low to mid range plated watches like Seiko and Citizen. I doubt they are REAL gold plate, and sometimes it would be nice to be able to fix just a small ding. Thanks for the help though! And more suggestions and information would be very welcome. Especialy on this vacuum plating.

[cdjswiss]

Interesting tell me more about the vacuum plating . Do you now if there is a video or somewhere you can read more about it ? 

 

You could start with

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evaporation_%28deposition%29

 

Then there is lots more information when Googling for 'Vacuum evaporation coating'

 

In the past I have made a simple apparatus using a large strong jar placed onto a flat metal base with a neoprene seal. The base has a single currant feed-through ( the return can be the metal plate as all is done with low voltage) and a tube outlet to the vacuum pump. This can be a good quality car tire pump used in suction mode (use the air intake end). The gold alloy is evaporated from a tungsten wire (about 0.5 mm dia.) bent into a tight hairpin shape and heated by the current from a car battery or other supply. The hot point is around the bend of the hairpin and it is here that the gold to be evaporated is placed. It is important that the rest of the tungsten does not get too hot since although gold is not oxydised  by the residual air in the jar the tungsten will be. The item to be 'plated' is heated up before placing it into the jar. Bear in mind that evaporation is a shadow technique and will only coat the side facing the heated wire (unless it is rotated during the evaporation). One of my own applications was to cast shadows of virus particles by evaporation of heavy metal (gold or molybdenum), for subsequent viewing in an electron microscope - makes them much easier to see.

 

Some easy, cheap, faux gold results can be obtained using gold solders with melting points in the range 600 to 800 deg C.

[Ray716]

That is interesting.. interesting indeed.. I will have to research that some more.  Thanks!

[rogart63]

You could also laser weld gold to stainless steel . That must be the easiest if you only should repair some small dings . There are some goldplating kits on Ebay and on the internet . Haven't seen them in work though  . Check goldplating.com and plating kit on Ebay out .

[Ray716]

So far the electroplating we have tried either looked too gold and not brassy enough, or came out black..