Note: Descriptions are shown in the official language in which they were submitted.
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This invention relates to an improvement of a base-
ball bat made of fiber-reinforced plastics (hereinafter
referred to as FRP).
Being superior in tensile strength and bending
strength FRP is desirably used for baseball bats. However, the
hardness which is one of the defects of resinous products is
relativel~ less than that of metallic materials. It is
therefore likely that the bat will be worn subject to friction
accompanied by impulsion and that surface scratches of the
bat will occur on the surface of the bat which strikes the
ball. This causes much unevenness on this surface due to said
scratches and cracks so that the bat is usually disposed of
before breaking.
According to the present invention the FRP bat is
plated with nickel or a nickel base alloy on its batting surface
to offset the defects, so as to make the surface hard and be
coated with a viscous coating layer and to decrease the
surface scratches caused by batting.
In the plating of nickel base alloysBrinell hardness
' 20 number for pure nickel is 250 - 500 but that for nickel-
phosphorus and nickel-boron alloys is more than 400 to show a
higher numerical value and a stronger resistance against coming
, off than ordinary steels. So far as hardness is concerned
plated metals such as chrome, tungsten and rhodium, which
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are superior to nickel, are lacking in viscosity and
inferior to nickel in impulsion. As for other soft metals
they have poor wear-resistancy, and it is recognized that nickel
~, or nickel alloy is best for the balance of hardness and viscosity
as a metal for coating the surface of baseball bats made of
, 30 FRP. Further, a nickel-phosphorus alloy or a nickel-boron
alloy may be given increased hardness by heat treatment so
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that if heat treatment is effected by determining, according
to the kind of FRP, the temperature range which may not
have influence upon FRP material, there will be obtained
raised hardness fit for temperature.
As regards the plating method, similar plated
members can be obtained irrespecti~-e of electroplating method
and electroless plating method, but the electroless plating
method is superior for uniform plating on the bat surface.
The FRP materials of the bat having on its surface
nickel plating or nickel alloy plating according to the
invention, may be selected, as a resinous matrix, according
to cost and the kind of ball from among thermosetting resins
such as phenol resin, epoxy resin, unsaturated polyester
resin and methacrylic acid resin and thermoplastic resins such
as ABS resin, AS resin, polyoxymethylene resin, nylon,
polycarbonate resin, polystyrene resin and polyvinyl chloride
resin. Further, the reinforcing materials are made in the
form of cotton, twisted yarn, cloth or felt of natural or
artificial inorganic fibers such as glass wool, asbestos
fiber, rock wool, slag wool, kaolin fiber and carbonaceous
fiber; these being sometimes blended, mixed spun, mixed
woven or laminated with hemp, cotton, silk, synthetic fiber,
artificial cellulosic fiber and paper fiber; finally moulding
a baseball bat. That is to say these materials are same as
the FRP materials employed for other general purposes.
The invention will now be described further, by
way of example, only, with reference to the accompanying
drawing which shows a schematic sectional view of a baseball
bat made of FRP according to this invention.
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In the drawing A depicts the baseball bat of the
invention and reference numeral 2 is a nickel or nickel alloy
plati~g layer, reference 1 is an FRP material and numeral 3
is a hollow portion.
The FRP moulded to form a bat will be plated under
the following conditions as an example.
(1) Material: Unsaturated polyester resin
reinforced with glass cloth
(2) Plating Process:
(i) The resin is first etched with an aqueous solution
of anhydrous chromic acid in dilute sulfuric acid
and then washed by water.
! (ii) Secondly the resin is activated with an aqueous
solution of palladium chloride and then washed by
water.
(iii) Electroless plating of nickel
Plating melt composition:
Nickel pyrophosphate: 26.7 g/l.
Ortho-boric acid: 1.2 g/l.
Ammonium sulphate: 2.6 g/l.
Sodium acetate: 4.9 g/l.
pH: 5.7 g/l.
Plating temperature: 21C
Plating time: 20 Hrs.
The following is a plating layer for which an
electroless plating was carried out under the above conditions.
Plating thickness: 20~
Plating layer composition: 6.5% P-Ni alloy
Plating layer hardness:
30Just and only adhered: 450 Hv
Heat-treated for drying at 120C:600 Hv
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