Abstract:
Electroless gold plating baths for plating metallized ceramics wherein the bath comprises (a) alkali metal gold cyanide, (b) alkali metal fluoride, and (c) alkali metal hydroxide. The baths may optionally contain a buffering agent and/or ammonium hydroxide and/or an organic chelating agent. The metallized ceramics contain tungsten, molybdenum, electroless nickel, copper and the like. The gold constituent in the alkali metal gold cyanide may be monovalent, trivalent or mixtures thereof. The method of utilizing such electroless or autocatalytic plating baths is also described and claimed.