Polishing plated case only

[richiesgr]

Hi

As I work on lot of inexpensive watches it comes a lot with nickel plated cases.

The case are not in good shape I'll post a sample.

My question is can you polish a plated nickel case (mainly because the plating itself will be attacked by the brush) ?

If yes do you have some advice : dremmel vs lathe, coumpound (blue, red, grey, green), technics.

If no mean that to restore a plated case is only by deplating, polishing then replating 

Thanks

[mikepilk]

Nickel plate is tough, but not very thick (10-20 microns?). So you can only polish out very slight surface scratches.

I use Dialux white on a dremel with a hard felt disk. 

As you say, if it's too bad you need to replate.

I've been experimenting with nickel plating recently with some pretty good results. I do electrolytic stripping, which always results in a pitted surface. So there's work to get the case nice and polished.

I tried making my own plating solutions, but the results were mixed. I finally bought some proper plating chemicals, and the results were very good - a really shiny even coating. 

 

[richiesgr]

Thanks for sharing 

I've tried deplating by electrolyse it was a catastrophic failure it has make literally holes in the metal.

I don't think it's even fixable I've tried to buff but at certain point the case form has started to degrade. What do you think ? 

[jdm]

On 11/11/2021 at 8:30 PM, richiesgr said:

I don't think it's even fixable I've tried to buff but at certain point the case form has started to degrade.

These are base metal plated cases and are basically not restorable unless you are willing to spend excessive money and time in replating. If you like to practice refinishing cases, get stainless steel watches.

[Fissile]

The only thing you can do with cases that are this far gone is to strip them and re-plate.  Years ago I nickel plated quite a few gun parts using the brush plating method.  I used to buy the plating stuff from a biz called Texas Platers Supply.  it was really inexpensive.   In my opinion brush plating works really well for small parts like watch cases, provided you do good prep work.   Unfortunately Texas Platers Supply seems to have gone out of biz.  The only hobbyist supplier of brush plating stuff today is Caswell.  See here: https://caswellplating.com/plug-n-plate-nickel-kit.html   I can't vouch for the Caswell products, never having tried them. 

[mikepilk]

If they were brass I would say, no problem to re-plate. But if they are base metal, as @jdm says, then I don't know.

Nickel plating isn't hard as long as you follow the three basic rules, 1 - clean. 2- clean, 3 - clean again

[jdm]

Ran into the topic below about a very good plating job

 

[Fissile]

I found the instructions for the brush plating supply I used years ago to plate small gun parts, see attached .pdf.   Don't allow anyone to tell you this BS.   Brush plating is commonly used in industry to plate a few small items, or even repair damaged plating on big items.  The finish this produces depends on the finish of the item plated.  This person on eBay sells small bottles of brush plating solution.  Brush Plating Solution   The best part about this plating method is that it costs very little.  That little jar of nickle plating solution will plate dozens of watch cases. 

Texas Platers Instructions.pdf

[jdm]

7 hours ago, Fissile said:

Brush plating is commonly used in industry to plate a few small items, or even repair damaged plating on big items. 

Correct. Here's another supplier in the US: https://surfinchemical.com/collections/all

 

[Fissile]

6 hours ago, jdm said:

Correct. Here's another supplier in the US: https://surfinchemical.com/collections/all

 

This is not electroplating, but chemical metal finishing.   This would not work for cases but I could see how this may be useful for things like dials or hands 

[xyzzy]

Has anyone used one of the cheap pen platers that show up on alix?  There seems to be one model about ~$140 that's sold from a hundred different sellers.  They look like clones of this "Rhodinette Pen Plater" but are 1/5th the price.

There's also a disposable battery operated pen, $42 at Ofrei.

Is a pen plater anything more than a DC power supply?  Is there any reason one can't just buy the pen for a few dollars on alix and use it with a lab supply?