Determination of thickness of metal layers on wires and strips

SnLAYER for determination of thickness of metal layers

When coating metals, wafer-thin layers are often sufficient to achieve the necessary effect. At the same time, homogeneous thin layers should be achieved that fulfil the required electrical properties and stability over many years. A few additional micrometres mean an increased, useless consumption of valuable material and thus unnecessary costs.

With ECH's SnLAYER analysis system, the coating thickness on metals is determined quickly and with high precision with only one single measurement. For this purpose, a new electrochemical method was developed, which is based on coulometric voltammetry and is oriented towards the standards DIN 1787 and DIN 40500, Part 5. The patented potential scan method enables the simultaneous determination of free and alloyed parts of coatings, e.g. tin on copper.

A typical measurement takes less than five minutes.

 

Applications

• Measurement of tin layer thickness on copper wires, copper sheets, wire strands
• Determination of alloyed and unalloyed tin
• Analysis of nickel, silver, copper and alloys on copper, steel, Percon and others
• Conductor board manufacture
• Wire and cable manufacture
• Quality management in rolling mills
• Applications in the metalworking industry

Advantages

• Complete measurement system for determination of the layer thickness of metal coatings
• Differentiation of free and bounded tin
• Fast analysis
• Customer-friendly handling
• Intuitive software
• Comprehensive statistic module
• Wide dynamic range for various wire-diameters and layer thickness
• Universally applicable for different types of layers

Features

• Typical duration: 8 min (non-alloyed and alloyed tin), < 2 min (non-alloyed tin)
• High precision of the analysis
• Currency will be registered in the provided potential range, freely adjustable in a range from - 2000 mV to + 2000 mV, e. g. - 600 mV up to + 300 mV
• Pre-defined methods specified for certain wire types
• Generation of individual methods
• Determination of the mass of the coating by integration of the current (amount of electric charge)
• Automatic procedures
• Determination of the thickness with only one measurement with high precision in a short duration
• According to the actual standard regulations

 

Data sheet