COATING WITH GOLD

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 80, Issue 242, 12 October 1937, Page 12

COATING WITH GOLD

NEW PROCESS DISCOVERED LONDON, Sept. 8. Examples of what is described as a new and easy method of depositing films of pure gold on glass and other surfaces have been loaned, by the discoverer of the process. Professor Charles S. Gibson, of Guy's Hospital Medical School, to the Imperial Institute. According to Professor Gibson, the

;ncw method may have considerable ; scientific application. A point of interest aroused in other minds, after inspecting the exhibits, is whether the opulent age of the golden mirror has arrived. 1 he films deposited are so extremely thin that they are transparent and show a beautiful greenish blue colour. Although of pure gold, deposited i chemically, the actual amount of gold u.,ed in filming a surface is stated to be extraordinarily economical. Among I the exhibits is a convex mirror of

about six inches diameter, and the cost of the gold used in backing it was only one-eighth of a penny. In a description of his process appearing in Nature, Professor Gibson wrote: “Brilliant films have been deposited on suitably prepared glass and other surfaces. By reflected light they appear as massive gold, and by transmitted light show the characteristic colours of thin gold films. The films are capable of being polished, but they can be produced in such a manI ncr as to render this unnecessarv.”