The Analysis of Connector Electroplating Problems

In the custom electroplating of connectors, the gold-plating process plays an important role in the electroplating of connectors because the contact pairs have relatively high electrical performance requirements. At present, except for some strip connectors that adopt selective electroplating process, the holes of a large number of pinhole bulk items are still plated by barrel plating and vibration plating. In recent years, the volume of custom connectors is more and more miniaturized, the problem of gold plating quality in the holes of pinhole bulk items becomes more and more prominent, and the quality requirements of users on the gold layer have become higher and higher. Some users even have an extremely critical requirement for the appearance quality of the gold layer. In order to ensure the quality of gold-plated layers of connectors, the resolution of these common quality problems is always the key to improve the gold-plating quality of connectors. The causes of these quality problems will be discussed in the following part.

The abnormal color of the gold-plated layer

The problems are that the color of the gold-plated layer of the custom connectors is inconsistent with that of the normal gold-plated layer, or the color of gold-plated layers of different parts in the same supporting product is different. The reasons are as follows:

1. The influence of impurities in gold-plated raw materials

The color and brightness of the gold layer will soon be affected when the impurities brought in by the chemicals added to the plating solution exceed the tolerance level of the gold plating solution. If it is influenced by organic impurities, darkening and misty phenomena will occur on the gold-plated layer, and the darkening and misty position is not fixed when it is checked by Hull Cell coupon. If it is interfered by metal impurities, the effective range of current density will narrow down, and the Hull Cell test shows that the test coupon end with low current density does not shine, or the test coupon end with high current density does not shine and the test coupon end with low current density can not be plated. The plated layer shows red or even dark and the color change in holes is more obvious when the problem is reflected on plated connectors.

2. Excessive current density in gold plating

Due to the calculation error of the total area of the parts in the plating bath, the value is larger than the actual surface area, so that the gold-plating current flow is too large. Or the amplitude is too small when using of vibration electrogilding, so the crystallization on the gold-plated layers of all or part of the plated connectors in the plating bath is rough, and the gold-plated layer reddens visually.