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Titanium plating

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I need to Titanium plate on stainless steel. Having never attempted this I need some suggestions.

D. Prickett
corporate recognition awards - Grand Rapids, Michigan

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Hi, D. You can't electroplate (in the conventional sense) titanium. The hydrogen in the water of solution will be reduced long before the titanium will be reduced.

It is not impossible to deposit titanium or any alloy of titanium in some fashion; in fact, titanium sputtered stainless steel sheet is commercially available -- but please explain what you are trying to do because conventional electroplating is impossible. Maybe it's titanium nitride vapor deposition (gold colored finish)?

Ted Mooney, P.E.
finishing.com
Brick, New Jersey

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What type of titanium plating are you looking to do on stainless? We supply titanium plated SS sheets (Type 300 series).

Thanks,

Michael Liu Taylor
specialty stainless steel distributor
Dallas, Texas

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Michael, by what method are you "plating" SS. Clad-ok, PVD-OK, Electroplated-I am with Ted, basically impossible, at least commercially.

James Watts
- Navarre, Florida

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Electroplating or electroless plating - no chance. However, try vacuum deposition technologies.

Trevor Crichton
R&D practical scientist The Pheasantries - Chesham, U.K.

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Titanium electroplating recipes:

I. 70 gm sodium metatitanate
30 gm sodium acetate
30 gm NaOH
Water-1 lit,30-70 C,1-5 A/dm2

II.100 gm Ti(OH)₂
40 gm HCl
100 gm NH₄Cl
1 lit water,pH 4-5,30-50 C,3-4 A/dm2

from L.I.Kadaner: Galvanostegia (Electroplating) , Kiev 1964.

Goran Budija
- Zagreb, Croatia

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You never cease to amaze me with your reference material, Mr. Budija! Now I really am curious -- but these formula don't seem to offer any exotic solution to the problem of plating so active a metal, and I have to wonder about their validity.

pic of Ted Mooney
Ted Mooney, P.E.
finishing.com
Brick, New Jersey

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Gentlemen:

Reading the full list of responses reminds me that the proper answer might reasonably be,"We cannot do it TODAY, but tomorrow the technology may allow it to be done." I would have agreed with all those who said it cannot be done, until one person steps up and says that it can. I am definitely going to file those ideas permanently.

Thank you,

Ed Budman
- Pennsylvania

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Sorry for being a little late on this response folks. However, some useful discoveries were made in the mean time, so you could thank me for that !

The original question regarding Ti was not about Ti at all (when I checked into it last time, couple of months ago.) Some people think (or call) titanium nitride or other decorative compounds of Ti as Ti. The person was looking for gold and other color coatings. So when someone asks for Ti plating next time, let's have our question ready, what color is it?

Mandar Sunthankar
- Fort Collins, Colorado

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I still am curious about Mr. Budija's recipes, and can only add that the older I get the more I learn there's always more that I ignore. Just one question to him and all the chemists out there reading this, since the chemicals he mentioned are really not exactly my field: About formula 2, can an alkaline salt Ti(OH)₂ be added to an acid solution of chlorides with a pH of 4-5 without precipitating its metal? Will the alkali be partially neutralized and water and titanium chloride form?

Thanks,

Guillermo Marrufo
Monterrey, NL, Mexico

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I am a student of Ph.D. (Chemistry)In Quaid-i-azam University Islamabad. I want to electroplate titanium on stainless steel. I do not know how it is done. I want to ask the procedure and possibilities of the reaction.

Java Intruder
student - Islamabad, Punjab, Pakistan

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Most of us think that it cannot be done, but if you read earlier letters in this thread, you will find two possible recipes. If you try it, let us know if it worked for you.

James Watts
- Navarre, Florida

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About titanium plating, I know that some peoples are actually working on a titanium plating process in organic media, at room temperature. Will it work properly ? Does coatings made with this process will be performance enough for industries requirements ? I don't know. However, as far as I know, preliminary tests were promising.

Moreover, as for Ted, that Titanium plating bath recipe presented on that discussion list left me speechless. This is the first time that I'm seeing a titanium plating bath made with water. My curiosity have been tickled and I will surely try it.

Daniel Picard
- Boucherville, QC, Canada

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Very, very late response to Mr.Mooney! I am just metalwork restorer, and once upon a time I have this book in my hands. Sorry for my [limited] English.

Goran Budija
- Zagreb, Croatia

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Currently we are trying to deposit Ti over SS by molten salt electrodeposition method, up to now we didn't get any positive result. Can anybody suggest the process parameters like selection of salt, current, temp.... Hoping for some reply.

Haran [last name deleted for privacy by Editor]
ME student - Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu, India

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Not many water sol. Ti cpds out there. make a new one. Isn't there Ti in bones? if its in your body isn't it water sol.?

Anthony Brown
- Dayton, Ohio

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I was doing a preliminary search on the feasibility of electroplating titanium onto Nickel and came across this message board.

Has anyone attempted the recipes proposed by Goran Budija, or confirmed the validity of the referenced material?

Its been about a year since the last post, so if anyone has had success during that time it would be great to hear about it. Thanks.

Ryan Walker
- Waterloo, Ontario, Canada

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Anthony: there's more to it than dissolving titanium into a water soluble compound. You still have the issue of reducing it before the hydrogen in the water reduces.

Ryan: Personally I don't think Goran's formulas have any chance of working, but no one so far has tried them and told us the results.

pic of Ted Mooney
Ted Mooney, P.E.
finishing.com
Brick, New Jersey

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Aluminum is electroplated commercially. Siemens patented this back in 1978. The formula they present in the patent uses toluene as one of the constituents. It seems to me that the issues with electroplating aluminum and titanium are similar - so why shouldn't the solutions be similar?

David Ruben
- Tempe, Arizona

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I'm familiar with the situation regarding aluminum. Although aluminum and titanium share the similarity of being more electronegative than hydrogen, 'similar' is context sensitive, and apparently they're not similar enough to be plated out of the same or 'similar' plating baths.

Ted Mooney, P.E.
finishing.com
Brick, New Jersey

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I am researching depositing small layers of Ti metal, I have found a reference that describes depositing Ti at room temp out of organic salts:

Electrodeposition of Ti from TiCl4 in the ionic liquid 1-methyl-3-butyl-imidazolium bis (trifluoro methyl sulfone) imide at room temp: study on phase formation by in situ electrochemical scanning tunneling microscopy

I. Mukhopadhyay et al Electrochemica Acta 50 (2005) 1275-1281

My problem is I'm looking to deposit on the order of 50-500 nm and this paper shows on the order of Angstroms shown with STM! If any of you take a look at this let me know if you think that I can deposit this relatively large thickness from what they show.

Thanks,
Ed

Ed Herderick
- Columbus, Ohio

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A granted patent in China and Taiwan and pending patent with USA, Japan, Australia and EUs of a process of depositing advance materials such as titanium under atmospheric pressure has been developed which is favorable for thin film coating.

The process requires further R and D to turn it to practical use. Published detail of US pending patent application no. 10/130,582. The writer is the sole applicant and ownership of IP.

Thomas Chang
- Hong Kong

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Titanium plating fairly thick ( 150 microns) layers on a polished glass substrate, releasable, is of interest for fabricating the thin mirrors needed for astronomy in space. Nickel mirrors are successfully produced in this way, particularly by Media-Lario in Italy, but titanium may be better in terms of weight and stiffness.
For our Luciola project of stellar interferometer ( www.oamp.fr/lise/seminaires/LabeyrieCNESLuciola.pdf ) we need 100 or so mirrors, 200 mm in size, having a modest optical quality since they serve as small solar sails.
Any test results, with electroplating or other methods ( Schoop projection , etc...), will be highly welcome.

Antoine Labeyrie
College de France - Caussols, France

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So after all, did anyone try Mr. Bujian's plating recipes?

I am about to try a process for depositing titanium by CVD, using the tetraiodide under flowing hydrogen at 450C. Does anyone have experience with this process? From what I've found,a DC or RF plasma is necessary, and thermal CVD will be insufficient. Can anyone confirm that?

David Carnahan
manufacturing - Newton, Massachusetts

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I am also very much interested to plate titanium onto a metallic surface from an electrolyte solution and that too at around the room temperature. Are there any such processes existing ? Further - has anyone ever tried out the co-deposition of titanium and boron to get titanium di-boride plating ? For that matter, is co-deposition at all possible from mixture of salts ?

thanks

Asimava Roy Choudhury
- Kharagpur, West Bengal, India

October 21, 2008

'Body jewellery
Physical vapor deposition is often used to produce black implant-grade, autoclavable body jewellery. Biocompatible titanium coating is vaporized in an arc then electrically deposited on stainless steel jewellery.'

Copy-pasted from the bottom of the 'physical vapor deposition' article, wikipedia.com

Daniel Williams
- Bloomington, Indiana

November 23, 2009

Electroplating of titanium from sulfuric acid solution . In reference to plating Titanium- why has to be reduced before hydrogen in order to be plated -please explain
Margaret

Margaret parker
engineer - san diego California

December 23, 2009

Hi, Margaret. Let's assume you have dissolved some titanium into the sulfuric acid, so the solution contains titanium ions. For simplicity we'll say they are Ti++ ions, although titanium can have other oxidation states too.

To electroplate the titanium as a metal onto a substrate we need to add electrons to those ions to reduce their oxidation state from +2 ionic state to the 0 metallic state:

Ti⁺⁺ + 2^e- => Ti⁰

But if (which is the case), this reaction is much much "easier":

H₂O + 2^e- => H⁰ + OH^-

Then what happens is that you can't electroplate titanium out of an aqueous solution because the electricity you put in all just goes to liberating hydrogen from the water. The same goes for aluminum and some other metals.

Regards,

Ted Mooney, P.E.
finishing.com
Brick, New Jersey

January 14, 2010

In reply to Asimava Roy Choudhury. Titanium diboride can be plated from molten salts - please check out Journal of The Electrochemical Society, 156 (2009) D131-D137 where it was deposited from NaCl-KCl-NaF-K2TiF6-KBF4 at 700°C

Adam Whitehead
electrochemical surface technology - wiener neustadt, Austria

March 2, 2010

There are many Russian books with chapter on titanium plating. Anybody can download some of them from next website http://lib.prometey.org/ (if you can read Russian).Hope it helps and good luck!

Goran Budija
- Zagreb, Croatia

April 12, 2010

Ever tried disolving standard liquidpaper in acidic solution and then plating the residue titanium by product?
hint hint

Ti02 can be dissolved in hydrochloric acid, chlorine gas is released and Ti is left in H20 solution, reduce and restore pH as necessary adding dissolved rock salt saline solution, and then plate titanium as per copper sulfate solution,

About 95% of titanium ore extracted from the Earth is destined for refinement into titanium dioxide (TiO2), an intensely white permanent pigment used in paints, paper, toothpaste, and plastics. It is also used in cement, in gemstones, as an optical opacifier in paper, and a strengthening agent in graphite composite fishing rods and golf clubs.

When used in the production or handling of chlorine, care must be taken to use titanium only in locations where it will not be exposed to dry chlorine gas which can result in a titanium/chlorine fire. A fire hazard exists even when titanium is used in wet chlorine due to possible unexpected drying brought about by extreme weather conditions.

Daniel Nittmann
alchemists intuitory - Hoppers Crossing Victoria Australia

April 13, 2010

Hi, Daniel. Yes, you can obtain titanium compounds and dissolve them in acid. But, no, you can't plate them out of an aqueous solution like you do with copper. The electrons you supply to the cathode will not reduce the titanium ions to titanium metal, but will simply liberate hydrogen gas from the water. The same reason you can't electroplate (from an aqueous bath) with magnesium and aluminum.

Based on some study of the history of chromium plating and proven fictions in Russian reports from a particular time period, these Russian reports of titanium plating from the same time period would appear to be a fiction.

Regards,

Ted Mooney, P.E.
finishing.com
Brick, New Jersey

S
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April 13, 2010

as an alternative to water, I believe the solution may be reduced to a white/clear powder and then mixed with certain molten semi conductor without hydrogen, hey seriously if y'all are worried about people counterfeiting coins I will stop posting (hint hint)

I wouldn't use titanium anyway, doesn't work well with nitrogen under cold fusion...too brittle

Daniel Nittmann
Alchemists Intuitory - Hoppers Crossing Victoria

April 14, 2010

Hi, Daniel. I see no mention of coins, counterfeited or not. I see no mention of cold fusion. For that matter, I see no mention of chlorine.

Are you on a different thread than us, or in a different dimension? :-)

Regards,

Ted Mooney, P.E.
finishing.com
Brick, New Jersey

February 6, 2011

Here's the problem: I have a unit on my swimming pool that produces chlorine by electrolysis of salt water. The unit obviously consists of an electronic control unit and a cell containing anode / cathode plates through which water is pumped. I have had the unit for about 5 years and it has worked perfectly up until now. The electronics is still OK, the electrolysis cell has given up. I tried to contact the original manufacturer but they've gone belly up.
According to the original sales literature the plates are titanium coated, which makes sense considering the reason for the electrolysis - i.e. to liberate chlorine not electroplate the electrodes.
The original cell is a sealed unit but I have managed to open it and modify the case to allow removal of the plates. The plates appear to be mild steel with a black coating which I guess is titanium. From the years of continuous use the plates have corroded especially around the connections used to carry the electric current, which have corroded away.
Now the questions: Is there a way I can coat mild steel plates with titanium at home? From what I've read here electroplating is out of the question. If not would someone let me know where I can have some of these plates manufactured. Or what about titanium plates, would the cost be astronomical? Finally, if titanium plates are an option is it possible to weld onto titanium, the original plates have 4 mm rods spot welded to form the terminals?

Roy Plant
- Johannesburg, Gauteng, South Africa

February 7, 2011

Hi, Roy. Titanium is more costly than steel, but less costly than silver. It requires heliarc welding like aluminum (see www.thefabricator.com/article/arcwelding/titanium-you-can-weld-it). It is available as solid sheets, and as a mesh, and probably as a "boxed mesh" like aluminum screens for windows.

Regards,

Ted Mooney, P.E.
finishing.com
Brick, New Jersey

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