Aspects of Adhesion of Metallised Plastics.

Abstract

Electroplating of a range of ABS plastics has been studied with particular reference to aspects of metal to polymer adhesion. Certain acetylacetonate transition metal complexes have been shown to promote adhesion of copper to ABS, and mechanisms for their action have been postulated. Alternative methods of plating ABS have been investigated. Some success has been achieved using swelling techniques. The mechanical properties of metal coated ABS and polypropylene have been studied and it has been shown that reinforcement theory can be applied to certain ductile metal coated composites to predict tensile strength. For low-level adhesion composites it was necessary to modify the theory by including an interaction factor. The problem of brittleness encountered with copper plated ABS composites has been overcome by careful design in the use of selective area plating, whilst retaining certain other desirable composite properties...