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Zinc finish on tubing (help)

We are zinc plating the outside of a tube that is around 11.0 long, the tube is honed finished on the inside and is done to spec. When we zinc it we get zinc on the inside and have to go back and re-hone the zinc out. This is taking to much time to do and our finisher has been no help at all in fixing this matter. What can we do to keep the finish out of the inside of the tube. We are doing about 200 ea. run and are trying to keep the cost down. Oh, the re-hone job takes about 15 min to do and every one hates to do it.
Thanks so much

Jay Neal
manufacturing - Wellington, Kansas, USA
April 23, 2009

If your racks and hoist can stand the weight, plug one end of the tube, fill it with clean water, plug the top end and rack it.
Plugging it without the water might work, but the tubes will want to float and that may cause problems. Without the water, the plugs might be blown out in the caustic tank enough to leak in follow on tanks.

James Watts
- Navarre, Florida
April 27, 2009

Why not skip the honing entirely until after plating?

Jeffrey Holmes, CEF
Spartanburg, South Carolina
April 29, 2009

sorry, this response was misplaced by finishing.com and is out of chrono order

1. put a rubber stopper at each end to block solution from entering the tube. Unless this is to be hot dip zinc.
You did not give enough information, i.e. what is the tube made of? what diameter? I guess aluminum because that is the only metal that requires a "zincate" Or do you mean zinc plating? or galvanize or?

Don Baudrand
Consultant - Poulsbo, Washington
(Don is co-author of "Plating on Plastics" [on Amazon or AbeBooks affil links]
and "Plating ABS Plastics" [on Amazon or eBay or AbeBooks affil links])
April 28, 2009

sorry, this response was misplaced by finishing.com and is out of chrono order

Sometimes when my wife doesn't like what I am saying she says "Put a plug in it."

Tom Rochester
CTO - Jackson, Michigan, USA
Plating Systems & Technologies, Inc.

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April 28, 2009

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