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SURFACE & FINISHING

Prior to the plating process, a surface must be cleaned and offer a perfectly pure substrate to receive a metallic finish with a good adhesion. Dirt and oxides must be removed in appropriated conditions.

Once a neutral salt-spray test and a singular coefficient of friction were the only key performance indicators for protective coated parts. Nowadays fasteners, for example, benefit from a steady coefficient of friction, even when subjected to multiple tightening, galvanic matching of different kinds of materials, cyclic corrosion requirements, conductivity, and many more.

Our world is under constant attack! Corrosion, friction, heat, and wear from our environment including rain, salts, particles and chemicals are just a few of the contributing factors that require a need for high performance coatings.
 
microGLEIT® is a globally renown brand that develops, manufactures and sells tailor made specialty lubricants that contribute to their customers’ success by expanding the performance limits of their products.
 
The increasing utilization of aluminium alloys today across many industries including Aerospace, Aircraft, Automotive, Transportation Equipment and Building and Architecture will continue to see growth since the benefits of utilizing lighter weight materials that provide good strength properties.

All types of aluminium alloys benefit from some type of chemical processing to provide an important property including hardness, abrasion resistance, colour, bonding of organic coatings, corrosion resistance or simply a visual impact to the surface of the part or component.

Today, parts and components for systems made from aluminium alloys are processed with anodizing, chemical conversion coatings, paint or other organic coatings to provide an important application property. These include protecting their surfaces from corrosion in service, or delivering good adhesion bonding of an important layer over the aluminium or to impart a decorative finish to the surface. For Architectural applications where the finish must be maintenance-free for several decades and for Aerospace/Aircraft applications there is only one opportunity to make it right the first time, it is critically important to provide the correct surface preparation for the alloy.

 

Decorative Technologies include advanced systems for Copper, Nickel, Nickel Alloy and Chrome plating that are engineered to meet the ecological, appearance and performance criteria of today’s demanding global markets, including OEM automotive.

Technologies

Copper

Our CUBRAC Acid Copper Technologies provide industry leading performance advantages such as burn free deposits with excellent low current deposit leveling and brightness. The CUBRAC Line of Acid Copper Technologies include dye, low-dye and dye-free processes engineered to meet specific requirements for a wide range of substrates, including Plastic, Aluminum and Zinc Die Cast.

The DIASTAR line of Non-Cyanide Alkaline Copper Technologies are industry leading systems for depositing a range of copper deposits aspects from dull to bright on steel, zincated aluminum and zinc die cast base metals.

Nickel

Nickel Technologies include a full range of bright, satin, semi-bright/sulfur-free, high sulfur, micro-porous and cracked systems to provide a decorative finish with improved and extended corrosion protection, as well as the appearance demanded by today’s markets.  The CRYSTAL Line of bright nickel technologies, CRITERION Line of semi-bright/sulfur-free and micro discontinuous systems, as well as our SATIN CRYSTAL Line of decorative satin nickel processes engineered to meet the global demands of our customers.

With the recent government regulations including ELV, Reach, RoHS and the demands for eliminating work place health hazards, the market for trivalent chrome systems to eliminate hexavalent chrome for decorative applications has grown substantially.  In addition to the environmental regulations, more stringent corrosion performance has been mandated by automotive OEM’s globally to meet the demands of Russian Mud, CASS and NSST corrosion requirements.

The more common applications for Plating On Plastics (POP) today are decorative components for automotive exterior and interior parts such as front grills, emblems, letterings and decorative strips.

In addition, there are also many applications in the areas of sanitary (plumbing) fittings, electronics such as decorative covers for mobile phones and household appliance components.

More than 90% of the plastic parts plated today are manufactured from ABS and ABS/PC resins. Both resin types can be mass produced with high surface quality with injection moulding processes. As a result, the plated surfaces and final layer finishes have a high optical quality combined with very high corrosion and abrasion resistance for the parts being coated which helps meet all appearance and engineering performance specifications.

The SILKEN POP pre-treatment consists of seven balanced single processes steps SILKEN CLEANER, SILKEN Etch, SILKEN NEUTRALIZER; SILKEN CATALYST; SILKEN ACCELERATOR, SILKEN METAL Electroless Nickel and SILKEN CU 801. There are various product choices in each category that provide flexibility for the applicator for easy adaptation into the production line.

The SILKEN BOND process is developed and targeting for the need of the next generation POP system providing a complete chrome-free plastic pre-treatment system for applicators and the Industry.

The SILKEN BOND Process is state of the art technology that can be integrated with minimal effort into existing plating lines and represents the future for processing plastics.

Our products don’t just finish your luxury items-they complete them. Our innovative precious metal technology and artful aesthetics give the brand owner the ability to direct the course of fashion – and the decision making of consumers.

Under the OMEGA Line, our portfolio of Coagulants, Cationic Polymers, Metal Precipitants, Anionic Polymers, Antifoaming Agents and Specialty Products will enable a complete compliance with your local environmental requirements. Effective water resource management is viewed as our corporate responsibility. Therefore we are fully committed to design the best solutions for water return, renewal and recycle and to participate in the global water conservation.
 
 

The Molclear brand, a market leading cathodic electrocoat range of products, has gaining a reputation as the most reliable and consistent lacquer available. This is achieved because we formulate the products from specialist polymers developed in our own laboratories, allowing us to develop resins with better curing at low temperatures as well as having very good wet film strength. This means no pre drying is required and that parts can be handled when wet with little risk of damage and roughness.

Using Molclear technology finishes ranging from Gold to Brass, from Stainless Steel to Antique Bronze can be applied to most metallic substrates.