Project Feature: Plating Line Barrels

Industrial plastics recently undertook a project to fabricate custom plating line barrels. Plating line barrels are used to assist in the washing/ plating of small parts that would normally be lost if dropped in a dipping/plating tank. Plating line barrels allow small components to be tumbled to ensure a uniform exposure. This process would not work on components sitting stationary against each other which would leave potential for an uneven exposure.

Due to the chemical and heat involvement in the multiple coating processes, a robust and resilient plastic material was required.

For these reasons a high quality thermoplastic known as polypropylene was used to make the plating line barrels.

Polypropylene’s key benefits are:

Very high chemical resistance
Excellent impact resistance
Good heat resistance
Very low water absorption

The fabricated plating line barrels where reverse engineered from a previously used unit at the end of its service life. Industrial Plastics was tasked to remake three new plating line barrels with the customer requesting a thicker wall for increased strength and sacrificial wear. The original unit was drawn in 3D with modifications to suit Industrial Plastics assembly methods and requirements.

Key factors of the plating line barrels fabrication meant the units needed:

Over 3200 holes drilled per plating line barrel
Matching cog wheels to the original machined part to allow tumbling and use with the original holding/ transport frame
Reinforcing strips and multiple welds inside and out to increase strength and durability
A complete tear down of the original unit with addition and compensations made for variations in the design

Do you have a product that needs replacing? Contact Industrial Plastics for any queries or if you have a requirement for a similar or custom Design. Units can be built in quantities ranging from 1 to 1000 depending on your requirement and our technical team can help with any designing aspects.