Iron Plating

[ithacaartist]

That's iron plating, not plating iron--as in depositing a layer of iron on the surface of some other metal, opposed to applying whatever metal to an iron piece.

Does anyone on the forum have any experience with the process?

[Major Tom]

And what would be the purpose? A new project?

[DonVoigt]

Never heard of it; can't recall any application.

Do you have an example of iron plating?

[Kiwi]

https://www.pfonline.com/articles/iron-plating(2)

I also had never heard of it but thought it was an interesting question
Google search - Electroplating Iron
shows that it is indeed a process very useful to add several '000 inch to build up a surface.
Surprise that there is more than one bath solution, and expected the cautions to avoid rust plating the target surface. Iron does have an affinity for Oxygen.

[lugerholsterrepair]

Plating steel bullets with copper?

[sheepherder]

Originally Posted by lugerholsterrepair

Plating steel bullets with copper?

Building up rust pits, scratches, and dents in a steel object preparatory to re-machining???

[Lyn Islaub]

That can also be done with hi velocity plasma coatings. We used plasma coatings extensively during the airline part of my career to build up worn flanges on turbine engine casings. Once machined, you couldn't easily tell it had been repaired. Some of these coatings went as high as .030 thick and still bonded successfully.

[sheepherder]

Originally Posted by Lyn Islaub

That can also be done with hi velocity plasma coatings.

I have never tried it, but there is also 'MIG spray welding'...

[ithacaartist]

Originally Posted by Lyn Islaub

That can also be done with hi velocity plasma coatings. We used plasma coatings extensively during the airline part of my career to build up worn flanges on turbine engine casings. Once machined, you couldn't easily tell it had been repaired. Some of these coatings went as high as .030 thick and still bonded successfully.

I have a flame-metalizing setup that I picked up perhaps ten years ago but have never used. It has a raft of different powdered metals/alloys from which to choose, depending on the specific application. It's basically an evaporative process which condenses/bonds to metal to build it back up to spec, same as the process you've described. Also similar to the "fume" work my son does in his glass-work.

[sheepherder]

Dave, if you can stand a 30 minute Youtube video, this Russian restores al old Ural motorcycle, and he does something like what you're looking for, I think...

https://youtu.be/y8HEZ-x4-_w

He even gives the chemical formulas...

[ithacaartist]

Originally Posted by sheepherder

Dave, if you can stand a 30 minute Youtube video, this Russian restores al old Ural motorcycle, and he does something like what you're looking for, I think...

https://youtu.be/y8HEZ-x4-_w

He even gives the chemical formulas...

He seems to be filling pits with lead by using an electroplating pad. Here's the one that started this thread: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cj8KXdbuyJ4

[George Anderson]

The only such "iron plating" I know of is iron on wood, examples being the Monitor and the Merrimack.

[ithacaartist]

It's part of the seemingly never-ending saga of figuring out a way to refinish zinc alloy Erma parts.

I've seen a YouTube in which a guy electroplated a penny with iron using an iron acetate solution and a nail as sacrificial material. The process demonstrated was not particularly precise, seeing as the guy wound up with the iron acetate as a mistake, but hooked stuff up to the juice to see what would happen. The result was a black iron coating on the copper, stuck well enough so that it didn't rub off. Enough iron was deposited to make the penny slightly reactive to a magnet.

Viewing this video made me think that plating various cast Zamak Erma parts with enough ferrous material might make it possible to apply a viable finish. The penny in question wound up pretty black, which would match the rest of the steel parts of an Erma pistol, which were hot blued at the factory.

I was hoping to establish whether iron acetate is the best solution, what concentration it or another chemical would need to be, and/or if pickling the castings would help--and what would best be used for that. If this idea works at all, it might be just the thing for pistols with ratty-looking cast zinc alloy frames, etc.

Rich, spray transfer of filler material is done via MIG welding, and it makes for a great weld. But it's not what I mean!