Some Electrical Troubleshooting Notes

When trying to figure out what is causing a particularly stubborn plating problem, and checking out the chemistry seems fine, you know that you sometimes have to check out the electrical area of the process. These are a few things you can do with a VOM (volt-ohm meter). First of all, be sure you have a good VOM that has built in capacitance and not a cheap “battery tester." Checking for AC Ripple from Rectifier If the rectifier has recently dropped a diode or has degraded filter capacitors, it may not be filtering out the unwanted AC current properly. When this happens, the AC ripple is … [Read more...]