Post bake for ENi on Aluminum per military or aerospace specification

[tmpnkc68]

I work for a plating company. We plate alot of Electroless Nickel on aluminum. Most jobs require being plated to a spec. All of the specs I have read specify the post-bake class according to whether the aluminum is heat-treatable,or non-heat treatable. My concern, is that I have noticed SEVERAL customers calling out a class that does not seem correctly correspond to the spec,example: 6061 alum. parts calling out a class 3 bake ( 375 f ). Would baking any of the heat-treatable alum alloys at the higher temp. classes, intended for the non heat-treatable alloys, anneal or adversly effect the alum in any way? It has remained our policy to post bake according to whatever the customer has asked for on their P.O.

 

[TVP]

Yes, heating 6061-T6 to 375 F will reduce its strength somewhat, since the T6 aging temperature is 350 + 10F for most product forms. This is much too high for any of the 7xxx series alloys as well.