CDP Lines

Technic’s CDP-2000 is a precision electroplating machine designed for high accuracy controlled depth precious metal plating onto loose parts, typically for pins and sockets for the electronic connector industry. Considering that only a small area at the end of the part needs to be electroplated, tremendous savings can be realized when compared with conventional plating methods.

Parts may include:

• Electrical connector pin and socket components
• Spring plunger contacts
• Terminal posts
• Or any other pin/cylindrical shaped objects manufactured as single components

Key Design Features

• Transport belts available with permanent inserts or removable cartridges depending on the volume and required flexibility.
• Dual processing lanes can be configured with the same or two different component configurations. Common chemical reservoirs supply process cells in each lane.
• Plating cells utilize precision fluid flow and level controls to produce controlled depth repeatability to within 0.5mm.
• Menu driven computer reconfigurable anodes provide plating flexibility for a variety of part types including difficult to plate parts requiring high throw into internal recesses.
• Contact roller connects cathode current to transport belt, providing noise-free low resistance electrical contact with minimal drag and no particle generation.
• Plating cells utilize a synchronized backup conveyor, which provides pressure on each part through the cells for reliable cathode electrical connection in transport belt.

Features & Benefits

• High, medium, or low volume production – Plated component throughput of 1000-20000 parts per hour
• Rapid payback with up to 70% gold savings over conventional barrel plated parts
• Unique plating cell and sparging design provides accurate and repeatable plating depth control and consistent part to part thickness uniformity
• Plating cell eliminates the ‘brown ring’ at the demarcation line between controlled depth deposit and base deposit.

Load/Unload Options

Manual or fully automatic, in-line or off-line loading and unloading of parts is available. Automation is accomplished using various technologies including:

• Vibratory bowl feeders
• Inline conveyor
• Scara robot
• Cassette-to-cassette

Gold Savings Case Study

Data presented here is the summary data from an actual case study demonstrating Gold & Dollar savings achievable when using the CDP-2000 versus barrel plating of connector sockets and pins. Plating thickness profiles used for the calculation of savings are averages of a 20 piece sample size taken from a 200 part run for both the parts.

Gold Savings for Pin

• 50m” overall barrel plate*
• 1.2 gm/1000 parts
• Selective plate + Au flash remainder
• 0.54 gm/1000 parts
• Gold savings of 0.66 gm/1000 parts, 55%
• 660 gm or 21 troy oz of Au for 1 million pins
• $16,800 at $800/troy oz Au

Gold Savings for Socket

• 50m” overall barrel plate*
• 2.16 gm/1000 parts
• Selective plate + Au flash remainder
• 0.69 gm/1000 parts
• Gold savings of 1.47 gm/1000 parts, 68%
• 1470 gm or 47 troy oz of Au for 1 million pins
• $37,600 at $800/troy oz Au