u/wildmakerwoman

Hi!

So I've been trying to test out some approaches to nickel plating. Eventually I want to plate a 3D print, but for now I'm practising on some small pieces of acrylic. Trouble is no matter what I do my plating is peeling off.

So far I've tried two different kinds of primer (one rattle can filler primer, one airbrush gloss black primer), followed by either graphite conductive paint or silver conductive paint. (The graphite paint is homemade, ratio of about 1:1 graphite and India ink airbrushed onto the surface, conductive paint is bought, thinned and airbrushed in a couple of layers).

All approaches give me a conductive surface in the hundreds of ohms range across the piece. I wrap them with copper wire to hang in the bath and agitate by hand every couple of minutes. I've used currents between 50mA and 200mA for various amounts of time.

All the pieces seem to plate really nicely, but once they're out of the bath the plating easily peels off in big sheets.

I think the chemistry of the bath is OK since I successfully plated a few copper pennies as practise - they get a beautiful even plate with no peeling.

Is it my primers dissolving in the bath and causing my graphite paint to slough off? Or is it something else I'm doing wrong?

I've even tried buffing the graphite powder straight into the black primer layer. This was less conductive but still plated at a slightly higher current. But same problem: the plating peeled off.