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Chocolate Gold – How is it Made?
There's a new craze slowly building out there for chocolate gold and no Virginia, I'm not talking about normally sane adults craving those gold coins that the kids gorge on over the holidays.
There is a special process, coming out of Italy (where they know gold better than most) called PVD (for physical vaporization and deposition), during which gold (typically rose) is placed in a vacuum chamber and the surface is bombarded electrically with a cathodic arc source. This process oxidizes the surface of the gold (similar to rusting) in a controlled manner and alters the color of the metal at a molecular level to produce a lovely molten brown gold reminiscent of rich Belgium chocolate.
Consumers should be aware that the PVD process actually changes the composition of the metal surface, it is not a chemical coating that will wear off over time, but a permanent change to the metal that can only be removed by grinding or scraping off the top layers of the metal itself. There have been a number of attempts to produce Chocolate Gold using various chemically applied thin film coatings over a base of 14K gold, these should be avoided as their permanence is in doubt.
At the start of the PVD process, the gold pieces are first cleaned. This cleaning process and the materials used vary depending on the type of gold and the shape of the jewelry pieces. The pieces are then loaded into the vacuum chamber on custom fixtures designed to optimize the amount of jewelry in the chamber and to insure a uniform coating is applied to all surfaces of the jewelry.
The vacuum chamber is evacuated to a high vacuum level (10-6 torr) in order to remove any contaminants that may be on the surface of the gold or in the chamber. Once the contaminants are removed, the chamber is filled with an inert gas (typically argon) that is ionized to prepare the jewelry for initial metal deposition.
A high current, low voltage arc is passed through the target (the solid material that is going to be molecularly deposited on the surface of the gold). The metal is evaporated and instantaneously ionized, then accelerated at high energies and deposited on the surface of the jewelry where it binds at a molecular level with the gold.
The basic properties of the metal being evaporated (target) remain unchanged during the metal deposition cycle. Changing the volume and type of gas during the reactive deposition cycle changes the nature of the coating applied to the gold.
It is these process changes that give the Chocolate Gold from different manufacturers distinctive differences that they hope will appeal to you and set them apart.
Check out the ChocolatOro material from Leslie's Gold, it is an outstanding example of Chocolate Gold in its most delicious form. Yummmmmmm.
For More Chocolate Gold:
ChocolatOro
There is a special process, coming out of Italy (where they know gold better than most) called PVD (for physical vaporization and deposition), during which gold (typically rose) is placed in a vacuum chamber and the surface is bombarded electrically with a cathodic arc source. This process oxidizes the surface of the gold (similar to rusting) in a controlled manner and alters the color of the metal at a molecular level to produce a lovely molten brown gold reminiscent of rich Belgium chocolate.
Consumers should be aware that the PVD process actually changes the composition of the metal surface, it is not a chemical coating that will wear off over time, but a permanent change to the metal that can only be removed by grinding or scraping off the top layers of the metal itself. There have been a number of attempts to produce Chocolate Gold using various chemically applied thin film coatings over a base of 14K gold, these should be avoided as their permanence is in doubt.
At the start of the PVD process, the gold pieces are first cleaned. This cleaning process and the materials used vary depending on the type of gold and the shape of the jewelry pieces. The pieces are then loaded into the vacuum chamber on custom fixtures designed to optimize the amount of jewelry in the chamber and to insure a uniform coating is applied to all surfaces of the jewelry.
The vacuum chamber is evacuated to a high vacuum level (10-6 torr) in order to remove any contaminants that may be on the surface of the gold or in the chamber. Once the contaminants are removed, the chamber is filled with an inert gas (typically argon) that is ionized to prepare the jewelry for initial metal deposition.
A high current, low voltage arc is passed through the target (the solid material that is going to be molecularly deposited on the surface of the gold). The metal is evaporated and instantaneously ionized, then accelerated at high energies and deposited on the surface of the jewelry where it binds at a molecular level with the gold.
The basic properties of the metal being evaporated (target) remain unchanged during the metal deposition cycle. Changing the volume and type of gas during the reactive deposition cycle changes the nature of the coating applied to the gold.
It is these process changes that give the Chocolate Gold from different manufacturers distinctive differences that they hope will appeal to you and set them apart.
Check out the ChocolatOro material from Leslie's Gold, it is an outstanding example of Chocolate Gold in its most delicious form. Yummmmmmm.
For More Chocolate Gold:
ChocolatOro
Submitted on: May 12, 2009 @ 6:25pm
Sunday 
