What Metals Can Be Electropolished? |
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Most metals can be electropolished successfully, but the best results
are obtained with metals with fine grain boundaries that are free of non-metallic
inclusions and seams. Those metals having a high content of silicon, lead
or sulfur are usually troublesome.
Stainless steel electropolishing the most frequent alloy electropolished, and
all alloys can be processed. Castings will polish to a bright finish but not
to the same brightness or smoothness produced by wrought alloys.
Most Commonly Electropolished Metals Include:
- 304 Stainless Steel
- 316 and 316 L Stainless Steel
- 400 Series Stainless Steels
- 17-4 pH
- MP35N
- Nitronic 60
- Elgiloy
- 2205 Duplex Stainless Steel
- Other Duplex Stainless Steels
Other Commercially Electropolished Metals Include:
- Low and High Carbon Steels
- Tool Steels
- High Temperature Alloys (Molybdenum, Nimonic, Waspaloy, Tungsten)
- Aluminum
- Titanium
- Copper
- Kovar
- Cupronickel
- Inconel
- Brass
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- Columbium
- Bronze
- Leaded Steel (Low-Lead)
- Nickel Silver
- Beryllium
- Monel
- Vanadium
- Hastelloy
- Tantalum
- Beryllium Copper
- Silver and Gold
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Many of the above metals can only be electropolished in
large production runs and in controlled environments. This is due to the
sometimes-costly set-up, tooling and special environmental and safety
equipment requirements associated with many of these processes.
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