I just got a batch of lures in polished gold steel and polished nickel steel. The gold looks good as always. But the one set of polished nickel steel lures is awful in comparison to the other polished nickel pair. I've had plain steel lures that were shinier. Since my personal metallurgical laboratory is presently closed for renovations is there any way to tell what is wrong? Is there a way to tell if there is any nickel deposited that I could polish myself? Or are the two on the right not plated and not polished? I can send them back to Shapeways if you folks want to do some quality control troubleshooting and determine what went wrong. The two lures on the left look good, on the right not so much.
Not yet. Before I do that I was wondering if anyone can chime in with more info about the process. If I can fix it with buffing and avoid more delays I'm fine with that. I suppose the big questions are 1) is this in the normal range of finish for polished nickel in which case I would stick with polished gold in the future because that finish is obvious and consistent and 2) in this particular case is it possible that the nickel plating does look dull before final polishing or buffing and that perhaps only that final step was missed? Or is the polishing done before plating and what comes out of the plater is the final product? Also, does anyone know of a simple test to see if nickel is present on the outside surface at all? Perhaps some simple chemical indicator test using common household chemicals?
I understand. 1) I've seen varying results reported with black and grey, but not with plated. If you're displeased with the results we want to know! 2) from what I know the platting is very thin. It'd make sense to me that the parts are polished, then plated. Polishing will vary, as the composition of the part can vary in bronze content. Plating should be fairly consistent. I have heard of the plating quickly wearing off because of a flaw in the platting process. I do know know of a way to test for the Nickle platting
Thanks. The fish usually like to see something sparkly but sometimes using a dark or black lure works just as well. The price for gold plating is the same as nickel so the proper selection comes down to what is consistent and best maintains finish after contact with water. I will need to perform dipping tests in fresh and salt water to satisfy my curiosity for those issues. I'll consult with customer service after I perform my civic duty and vote. I think the buses from the retirement home should be cleared out of the parking lot within the next hour or so.
I know what salt water does to regular stainless It will turn green. I believe the plated stainless is coated. Not sure how long it'll hold up to exposure to water and fishy nibbles.
I have a regular stainless one that I sprayed with a clear coat finish and it still looks like new after several fishing expeditions and 5 or 6 teeny fish caught with very large appetites at the local freshwater pond. Maybe it didn't need an extra coat but it doesn't hurt.
According to customer service 1) polishing is inconsistent and 2) the (stainless steel?) material is corrosive which can affect the finish. There's nothing Shapeways can do about this problem. I take that to mean that plated options for stainless at Shapeways are a waste of money. If Shapeways can't maintain the look of a plated finish with some semblance of repeatability/quality because of fundamental material properties why bother? I guess my new mission is to analytically determine if there was any nickel plating at all on the parts in question. This is going to be a DIY customer quality control and analysis issue.
This appears to come up every few months, see e.g. here and here. The actual problem seems to be the varying bronze content near the surface of the composite that messes with the plating. At one time Youknowwho4eva offered to get the web team to put more pictures on the materials page to show the range of variations, and even earlier I guess shapeways would have simply reprinted the part if it was too far outside expectations. The conventional test for nickel involves a chemical called dimethylglyoxime which forms a blood-red complex with nickel even at low concentrations. I do not know if it is possible to buy this nowadays as a non-professional without bringing the entire alphabet soup at your heels. Also note that many nickel compounds are known or suspected carcinogens.
Something like this test meant to examine jewelry finishes might be useful: https://nonickel.com/collections/solutions-for-nickel-allergy /products/nickel-alert-nickel-test-kit But if there's also nickel present in the ordinary stainless steel a test like this may not help. They might have a test like this available at the local drug store. The parts were ordered at the same time and arrived in the same shipment. Unless the two pairs of parts were in different batches of infusion or plating or polishing they should have very similar appearance. I have a buddy that works at a place with high power inspection scopes. There might be a slight difference in physical surface micro-texture for plated vs. unplated so that seems like a good place to start. Off hand I can't think of other quick tests that aren't destructive. And I don't want to physically polish the parts until I'm sure there is some nickel there to polish. I'm not worried about the fish being allergic to nickel since their ultimate fates might be much more traumatic.
By golly it does look that way. But I don't think that should affect the overall color differences, and the finishes at the sides of both are different at the ground down sprue points. On the second pair I had included platforms that could be used as sprue points but instead they went with the sides. I might as well remove the sprue platforms since they detract from the designs (not that the fish care). The platforms stick out slightly which is probably why they inverted those parts. Otherwise the two designs are basically the same shape. The idea is to have some variations like holes that allow fuzzy or rubber inserts in some lures for more action in the water.
I give up. All that Shapeways service has been able to accomplish is to remanufacture the incorrect pair of parts which have apparently just been shipped to me. And on top of that they are sending TWO copies of the incorrect model. The ones that have been remanufactured were just fine in the original order. I notified Shapeways service that the incorrect pair was being remanufactured when I noticed that that my order page included the replacement order, and then the Shapeways representative noticed that a quantity of two had been ordered. She was going to forward all that information to someone else and that's the last I heard on the subject. In addition to that I received an automated service feedback rating email that I could not respond to, perhaps because the incorrect replacement parts have been shipped? Okay, one last time: The model that had the problem was model # 2739790 from the original Order ID: Order #79xxxx.