Question

Explain electroplating with suitable example.

Answer 1

Electroplating is the process of depositing a layer of a metal on a metallic or a nonmetallic electrode by electrolysis in an electrolytic cell.

Let us take an iron spoon which is to be electroplated with copper. For this, we take a copper plate and an iron spoon as electrodes and copper sulphate $\left(CuS{O}_4\right)$ is taken as an electrolyte. The electrodes are connected through an external circuit as shown in figure. On passing current through the electrolyte, it is decomposed into $C{u}^{2+}$ and $(S{O}_4{)}^{2-}$ ions.

As $C{u}^{2+}$ ion is positively charged, it moves towards the negative terminal i.e. iron spoon and gets deposited on it. Thus, iron spoon gets plated with copper. There is no scarcity of $Cu$ atoms because the copper atoms go into the solution from the positive terminal i.e. copper plate. This process called electroplating continues until the iron spoon gets coated with copper.