Metallic nonelectrolytic alloy coatings produced from aqueous solutions are commercially used in several industries, including electronics, aerospace, medical, oil and gas production, chemical processing, and automotive. Nonelectrolytic coating systems use two types of reactions to deposit metal onto a part: electroless and displacement. This article explains the various types of electroless and dispersion alloy coating systems. It provides information on the processing of parts, process control, deposit analysis, and equipment used for coating nonelectrolytic displacement alloys. The article concludes with a discussion on the safety and environmental concerns associated with nonelectrolytic deposition processes.

Electroless nickel plating is used to deposit nickel without the use of an electric current. This article provides an overview of the solution composition and characteristics of the electroless nickel bath. It focuses on the metallurgical, mechanical and physical properties of electroless nickel-phosphorus coatings and electroless nickel-boron coatings. The effect of electroless nickel coatings on the fatigue strength of steel is also described. The article includes information on the recommended pretreatment procedures for different ferrous alloys, aluminum alloys, and copper alloys. It presents a detailed account of the equipment and various processes—including bulk and barrel plating—involved in electroless nickel plating, and discusses hydrogen relief methods. The article includes a comprehensive table on nickel plating applications, and concludes with information on electroless nickel coatings on composites and plastics.

This article describes the steps, bath composition and characteristics, equipment, plating rate, deposit thickness, and applications for different types of nonelectrolytic deposition processes, including electroless nickel plating, electroless copper plating and mechanical plating.

This article discusses the fundamentals of electroplating processes, including pre-electroplating and surface-preparation processes. It illustrates the four layers of a plating system, namely, top or finish coat, undercoat, strike or flash, and base material layers. The article describes various plating methods, such as pulse electroplating, electroless plating, brush plating, and jet plating. It reviews the types of electrodeposited coatings, including hard coatings and soft coatings. The article also details the materials available for electroplating, including electroplated chromium, electroplated nickel, electroless (autocatalytic) nickel, electroless nickel composite coatings, electroplated gold, and platinum group coatings. These are specifically tailored toward plated coatings for friction, lubrication, and wear technology. The article concludes with a discussion on the common issues encountered with electroplating.

The process of coating plastics with metals for functional purposes is called metallizing of plastics. This article discusses the metallizing of plastics, provides information on its history, and gives a short note on applications and adhesion properties of metallic coatings. It also discusses the selection of plastics for plating. This article also describes metallizing techniques, including plating (electrolytic or electroplating), vacuum metallizing and thermal spraying, and environmental considerations. The article discusses the quality assurance procedures for metallized plastic parts which include tests that assess the quality of the finish, coating thickness, adhesion, and corrosion resistance, and gives a short note on service performance, which includes service condition classifications.

Aluminum components are often plated with other metals to mitigate the effects of corrosion and wear, improve application performance, and extend service life. This article discusses some of the more common aluminum plating processes, including electroplating, immersion plating, and electroless plating, and describes various plating materials and the types of applications in which they are used. It provides critical processing details such as temperatures, ratios, ranges, times, and rates. The article explains how to prepare aluminum components for electroplating, discussing surface roughening, anodizing, and immersion procedures along with expected results.

Electroless, or autocatalytic, metal plating is a nonelectrolytic method of deposition from solution that can be plated uniformly over all surfaces, regardless of size and shape. The plating's ability to plate onto nonconductors is an advantage that contributes to the choice of electroless copper in various applications. This article provides information on the bath chemistry and deposit properties of electroless copper and discusses the applications of electroless copper plating, such as printed wiring boards, decorative plating-on-plastic, electromagnetic interference shielding, and hybrid and other advanced applications. It describes two commercial processes, pretreatment and post-treatment. The article reviews the solutions used, controls and control equipment, and performance criteria of electroless copper plating. It concludes with information on the environmental and safety issues associated with electroless copper plating.

Laser surface hardening is a noncontact process that provides a chemically inert and clean environment as well as flexible integration with operating systems. This article provides a brief discussion on the various conventional surface-modification techniques to enhance the surface and mechanical properties of ferrous and nonferrous alloys. The techniques are physical vapor deposition, chemical vapor deposition, sputtering, ion plating, electroplating, electroless plating, and displacement plating. The article describes five categories of laser surface modification, namely, laser surface heat treatment, laser surface melting such as skin melting or glazing, laser direct metal deposition such as cladding, alloying, and hardfacing, laser physical vapor deposition, and laser shock peening. The article provides detailed information on absorptivity, laser scanning technology, and thermokinetic phase transformations. It also describes the influence of cooling rate on laser heat treatment and the effect of processing parameters on temperature, microstructure, and case depth hardness.

This article focuses on alternatives to chromium in both hard chromium plating and chromate conversion coating. These include electroless nickel plating, nickel-tungsten composite electroplating, spray coating applications, and cobalt/molybdenum-base conversion coating. The article discusses the material and process substitutions that can be used to eliminate the use or emissions of chromium in industrial processes. It describes the physical characteristics of each coating, economics, environmental impacts, advantages, and disadvantages of alternative processes.

This article discusses the various factors that affect the corrosion performance of electroplated coatings. It describes the effects of environment and the deposition process on substrate coatings. The article provides a discussion on the electrochemical techniques capable of predicting the corrosion performance of a plated part. It reviews the designs of coating systems for optimal protection of the substrate. The article also discusses controlled weathering tests and accelerated tests used to predict and determine the relative durability of the coating.

Chromium alloys yield alloy coatings with properties that range from completely satisfactory to marginally acceptable, depending on the end use. This article provides a detailed description of plating solutions and deposition conditions and rates of chromium-iron, chromium-nickel, and chromium-iron-nickel alloys.

Surface treatments are used in a variety of ways to improve the material properties of a component. This article provides information on surface treatments that improve service performance so that the design engineer may consider surface-engineered components as an alternative to more costly materials. It describes solidification surface treatments such as hot dip coatings, weld overlays, and thermal spray coatings. The article discusses deposition surface treatments such as electrochemical plating, chemical vapor deposition, and physical vapor deposition processes. It explains surface hardening and diffusion coatings such as carburizing, nitriding, and carbonitriding. The article also tabulates typical characteristics of carburizing, nitriding, and carbonitriding diffusion treatments.

The selection of surface treatments for copper and copper alloys is generally based on application requirements for appearance and corrosion resistance. This article describes cleaning, finishing, and coating processes for copper and copper alloys. These processes include pickling and bright dipping, abrasive blast cleaning, chemical and electrochemical cleaning, mass finishing, polishing and buffing, electroless plating, immersion plating, electroplating, passivation, coloring, and organic coatings.

Coatings and other surface modifications are used for a variety of functional, economic, and aesthetic purposes. Two major applications of thermal spray coatings are for wear resistance and corrosion resistance. This article discusses thermal (surface hardening) and thermochemical (carburizing, nitriding, and boriding) surface modifications, electrochemical treatments (electroplating, and anodizing), chemical treatments (electroless plating, phosphating, and hot dip coating), hardfacing, and thermal spray processes. It provides information on chemical and physical vapor deposition techniques such as conventional CVD, laser-assisted CVD, cathodic arc deposition, molecular beam epitaxy, ion plating, and sputtering.

This article provides a brief review of the classification and characteristics of cast irons. It describes the processes used to clean iron castings, including mechanical cleaning and finishing and nonmechanical cleaning. The article discusses surface treatments used to extend casting life when resistance to corrosion, wear, and erosion is required. The common methods include electroplating, electroless plating, hardfacing, weld cladding, surface hardening, porcelain enameling, and organic coatings.

This article is a general introduction to surface engineering of engineering components, providing an overview of the applications of surface treatments and the environmental protection regulations directly or indirectly related to surface engineering processes.

This article presents general design principles for different types of surface-finishing processes, such as cleaning, organic coatings, and inorganic coatings applied by a variety of techniques. It discusses the factors that influence the selection of surface-finishing processes. These include fabrication processes, size, weight, functional requirements, and design features. The article discusses the design as an integral part of manufacturing. It contains tables that summarize the design limitations for selected surface-preparation, organic finishing, and inorganic finishing processes.

Copper can be electrodeposited from numerous electrolytes. Cyanide and pyrophosphate alkalines, along with sulfate and fluoborate acid baths, are the primary electrolytes used in copper plating. This article provides information on the chemical composition, plating baths, and operating conditions of electrodeposition processes for chromium plating, nickel plating, iron plating, cadmium plating, zinc plating, indium plating, lead plating, tin plating, silver plating, gold plating, brass plating, bronze plating, tin-lead plating, zinc-iron plating, and zinc-nickel plating. The article also discusses selective plating, electroforming, and other processes and where they are typically used.

Soldering represents the primary method of attaching electronic components, such as resistors, capacitors, or packaged integrated circuits, to either printed wiring board whose defects is minimized by consideration of proper PWB design, device packages, and board assembly. This article discusses the categories that are most important to successful electronic soldering, namely, solders and fluxes selection, nature of base materials and finishes, solder joint design, and solderability testing.