I have an anode in the Rhodium tank that is darkened. The bath had gone dark and slightly greenish. I was out and had them change the bath. I didn’t know the anode was compromised. That was a few weeks ago. Today I saw the bath was discolored again. When I pulled the anode out to look at it, I saw that it is badly discolored. My guess is that something has happened to the anode and that has caused contamination in the bath. It could be the anode is just too old and the platinizing is gone. I’ve been working on a new anode build to test. (I’m not about to replace the bath while the current anode is in place.)
Has anyone seen this happen before?
Thanks,
Ruthanne Robertson
Bench Jeweler Team Lead
Legacy Touch, Inc.
I saw this happen when I changed Rhodium manufacture brands, the anode worked for years with the original brand I used. However, when I changed brands it was causing black greenish reactions. Went back to the old brand and presto back to normal, strange. Have you tried using a piece if gold wire as a lead to see of the rhodium works when not using the old anode?
We haven’t changed Rhodium brands. Our plating rack is stainless steel. It’s pretty apparent that the anode was de-platinized. I built new anodes and the problem has gone away. The discolored Rhodium would settle out after a few days on the shelf so we were able to reuse it.
I’m not surprised the anode was shot, we plate a great deal all day long and those anodes hadn’t been replaced for 6 years. Now we are pulling the anodes out of the solution at night to decrease un-neccessary wear.