Fengfan High temperature Acid Zinc Plating Potassium Chloride Electroplating Additives ZN-618

Product Overview

This is a matched pair of components working as one set of acid zinc plating chemicals: component A is the primary brightener, added in small amounts, and component B is the auxiliary that carries most of the volume. Both go into a bath built on zinc chloride, potassium chloride and boric acid — the chloride zinc formulation most rack and barrel shops already run.

Because the two are matched to each other, the bath holds its balance better than a mix of unrelated additions, and that is what a buyer is really comparing when shortlisting electroplating chemicals on price alone.

What separates this product is heat. Plating rooms without chillers watch the bath warm through the shift, and a standard brightener loses gloss and leveling as it does. This one is formulated to keep working in that condition, so a line in a warm climate or a crowded plant room can hold a bright finish without adding refrigeration. Everything else in the plating process stays as it is: same pre-treatment, same passivation, same rack or barrel handling.

Complex parts get the most from it. Deep recesses, threads, sharp edges and mixed wall thickness are where a weak brightener leaves dull patches, and where good leveling takes polishing time back out of the job.

Key Performance Advantages

• High gloss with genuine leveling — the deposit comes out bright and smooth, filling the fine polishing lines that otherwise show after plating. On visible parts that means less buffing and fewer rejects at final inspection.
• High current efficiency — most of the current goes into zinc rather than into hydrogen, so a rack plates faster and the bath picks up less heat under load than an inefficient system would. Over a shift, that difference shows up as output.
• Built for hot baths — heat is the variable that breaks a chloride plating process first, and this system is the one in the range tuned for it. Where a conventional brightener dulls as temperature climbs, this one keeps its gloss and leveling, which is why a line without refrigeration equipment can still hold a bright finish.
• A stable, forgiving bath — the components are matched, so a small dosing error does not swing the deposit from bright to dull. That makes the metal plating process easier to hand over between shifts and easier to correct when something drifts.
• One pair of components for rack and barrel — stock one system instead of two and move work between line types without changing chemistry. Only the salt levels and current density move, as the table below shows.
• Strong on complex geometry — recesses, threads and shielded faces still take a bright, level deposit, which is exactly where simpler zinc electroplating chemicals leave dull patches that need polishing out.

Process Window & Bath Composition

Bath Make-Up & Start-Up

1. Clean the tank, the anode bars and the pipework first. Old sludge, scale and cleaner residues — including any surface active agent left from a previous bath — will contaminate the new solution, and dirty contacts cost more brightness than a wrong addition ever will.
2. Fill to about two-thirds of working volume with water, then dissolve the potassium chloride and the zinc chloride. Warm water speeds this up; stir until the salts are completely in solution.
3. Add the boric acid and keep stirring until the bath is clear.
4. Add component B at 30~40 ml/L and circulate, then add component A at 0.3~1 ml/L. Bringing the auxiliary in first spreads it through the tank before the brightener is dosed, which gives a more even start.
5. Set the pH into the 4.5~6.0 band using a freshly calibrated meter, and adjust in small steps rather than one large correction.
6. Filter the bath, confirm the anodes are bagged, and check that the anode area sits inside the SK:SA 1:1.5~2 ratio.
7. Plate a scrap rack or a small barrel load before releasing the bath to the electroplating line, and look at recesses as well as flat faces — that is where a make-up error shows up first.
8. Record the make-up quantities and the batch numbers of the electroplating chemicals you used, so replenishment stays traceable and any problem can be traced back to a lot.

Anode Selection

In both the rack and the barrel column the anode is 0# zinc ingot, run in bags so that anode sludge stays out of the deposit. Anode area is set at SK:SA 1:1.5~2 — at least one and a half times as much anode area as cathode area, and up to twice. That range is wider than it looks, and it matters more on a hot bath than on a cool one.

Anodes that are too small for the load force the rectifier to work harder, and the far end of a rack or the middle of a barrel load pays for it with a thinner, duller deposit. Generous anode area keeps current distribution even, which is exactly what a bright, well-levelled finish depends on.

Day to day, anode care is mostly discipline. Keep the bars clean and the contacts bright, because one corroded contact quietly unbalances the whole tank. Keep the ingots immersed and top up before the exposed area grows large. Clean the bags before they load up, and do not let fines settle into a compacted layer on the tank floor where they cannot be removed without disturbing the bath.

In acid zinc plating chemicals the anode is not a passive consumable; it is part of the dosing. A 0# ingot dissolves cleanly and keeps the zinc metal level steady, while a lower grade brings impurities in at the same rate as it brings zinc. Weigh the anodes against the ampere-hours you have run at each shutdown — a falling zinc figure is easier to explain as a shrinking anode than as a dosing fault.

Bath Maintenance & Impurity Control

• Iron is the usual suspect. Rack tips, steel parts and drag-in from pickling all bring iron into a chloride zinc bath. It dulls the deposit, clouds the solution and pushes brightener consumption up, so fix the source rather than adding more plating chemicals.
• Watch what the rinse carries in. A short rinse after degreasing leaves residual surface active agent on the work, and it ends up in the zinc bath as pitting, haze or poor adhesion that looks exactly like a brightener fault. Lengthen the rinse or add a drag-out tank before you touch the dosing.
• Hold pH inside 4.5~6.0. Running high costs brightness and coverage; running low attacks the anode and drives zinc up. Check daily and correct in small steps.
• Keep boric acid where it belongs. At 25~35 g/L it buffers the cathode film. When it falls, high-current-density areas burn and the gloss goes flat.
• Dose by measurement, not by eye. Component A works in a narrow 0.3~1 ml/L band, so a rough addition is the quickest way to unbalance a bath that was running well. Log every addition against the work you plate.
• Filter, skim and clean on a schedule. Anode sludge and shop dirt give a roughness that no brightener can hide, which is why continuous filtration is standard on a chloride plating process and not an optional extra.
• Replenish to your line, not to a calendar. The dosing bands in these zinc electroplating chemicals suit continuous production; a shop plating two racks a day and a shop running three shifts draw them down at very different rates. Track consumption against output and read a rising figure as a message about the bath.

Ordering, Documentation & Storage

1. Tell us about the line — tank volume, rack or barrel configuration, substrate and the finish you are aiming for on your electroplating line — so the working concentrations can be confirmed for your tank rather than copied from a general sheet.
2. Choose the packing that fits your store. Standard supply is 25 kg per bucket; other formats we pack are 10 kg/box, 25 kg or 50 kg/bag, 20 kg/25 kg/30 kg/200 kg/drum and 1000 kg/IBC drum.
3. Confirm the minimum order quantity for this product — it varies by chemical and is agreed with our sales team per order.
4. Agree the payment term: 100% T/T in advance.
5. Plan the timing: production lead time is 2 weeks.
6. Shipping is arranged per the terms agreed in the current contract.
7. Collect the documents: an inspection certificate is issued after delivery stating the batch number and warranty period, and the SDS plus the product-specific compliance statement for your market can be issued with the delivery paperwork for these plating chemicals.
8. Store on arrival in the closed original container, under cover, out of direct sun and away from hot plant areas, and handle with gloves and eye protection as set out in the SDS.

Deposit Thickness & Corrosion Performance

Thickness is a decision, not a by-product. The zinc layer your customer measures is set by current density multiplied by time. The additive decides how that layer looks and how evenly it sits across the work, but it does not add microns on its own. That is why a promise written as a band, with the place it is measured, holds up better than a single figure: recesses, thread roots, the inside of a barrel load and the far end of a rack always read thinner than a flat face, and an inspector will find those spots.

Writing a specification that can be repeated

Name three things together — the zinc thickness after plating, the passivation and sealing applied over it, and the corrosion test the part will be judged by. A salt spray figure quoted on its own cannot be reproduced by anyone, because the hours a part survives move with coating thickness, passivation colour, sealer strength, rinse quality and the test conditions themselves. Written as a set, the same sentence works for every batch and settles every argument with a customer.

What the finish looks like

Gloss and leveling show up as a bright, smooth deposit that closes over fine polishing lines and keeps its colour into recesses and threads. That is what an inspector sees before any instrument comes out, and it is what a returned lot is usually about.

Where corrosion results are actually lost

Most failures come from somewhere other than the zinc layer: a passivation bath that has drifted, a rinse carrying contamination forward, a sealer diluted below its working strength, or a thickness reading taken on a flat face when the drawing calls for a minimum anywhere on the part. Plate a witness rack alongside production and test that one — it separates a plating problem from a post-treatment problem in a single shift, before a whole lot is at risk.

What to ask us for

An inspection certificate stating the batch number and warranty period comes with the delivery of these electroplating chemicals. If your customer's drawing carries a salt spray requirement, tell us the thickness, passivation system and test method you will be judged on, and we will confirm what data we can support for that exact combination. Do it before you quote rather than after a lot is rejected; the metal plating process behind the number matters far less than the conditions attached to it.

Bath Temperature & Plating Time

• Measure the bath, not the room. Take the temperature at working depth in the tank, at the start of the shift and again at its hottest point. A plant room that warms through the afternoon changes the bath more than the weather forecast suggests, and a reading taken at the tank lip tells you very little.
• There is no chiller to lean on, so know the ceiling. This system is formulated for lines without refrigeration equipment and holds gloss and leveling in a warm bath. That is tolerance, not immunity: confirm the working band for your tank with us and treat the top of it as a limit to stay under rather than a target to run at.
• Heat is paid for in consumption. Brightener breakdown speeds up as the bath warms, so the same output costs more component A in summer than in winter. Track additions against ampere-hours or kilos plated, and read a rising trend as a temperature story before you suspect the additive.
• Time follows the thickness target. Thickness comes from current density multiplied by time. Decide the deposit your customer needs, then pick the pair that gets there inside the rack band of 0.5~5 A/dm² or the barrel band of 0.1~3 A/dm². Shortening a cycle by raising current density puts more load on edges, tips and the outside of a barrel load, and that is where burning and dull patches begin.
• Barrel work needs the longer cycle. Parts in a barrel make intermittent contact and see less effective current than the same part on a rack, which is why the barrel current density band sits lower and the cycle runs longer. Do not close that gap by pushing the current above the band.
• A hot bath that goes dull is usually not short of brightener. Check pH, boric acid and iron first. Heat and iron together are the classic pair behind a deposit that loses its gloss halfway through a shift, and adding more acid zinc plating chemicals on top of that only moves the problem.
• Keep a shift log. Temperature, pH, current density, time, component additions and the batch number of the zinc electroplating chemicals in use. When a finish drifts, that record answers in minutes what guesswork takes a week to find.

Technical Support & Model Matching

Choosing the right match is where most sourcing decisions stall. As a trading supplier, we keep one point of contact from first enquiry to after-sales: tell us what you are making and the conditions you work under, and we shortlist the closest matches from our supplier network, compare specifications and arrange samples before you commit to a bulk order. If something does not behave as expected, we work with the supplying partner on the cause and a practical fix, and stay with the case until it is settled. Email, WeChat or WhatsApp enquiries get a reply within 24 hours.

FAQ