ICP-AES Determination of Copper in Plating Layer of Steel Cords of Meridional Tire and Thickness of the Plating Layer

ICP-AES was applied to the determination of copper in the plating layer of the steel cord of meridional tire and also the thickness of the plating layer. The sample of the steel cord was treated with 15 mL of NH3·H2O (1+1) solution and 1 mL of 30% (wH2O2%) H2O2 solution to dissolve the plating layer,and then the solution was acidified with 15 mL of HCl (1+1) solution. Analytical spectral line of 217.894 nm was chosen for the determination of Cu. Linear relationship between values of emission intensity and mass content of Cu was kept in the range within 8.50 mg with detection limit (3s) of 0.01 mg·L-1. The proposed method was applied to the analysis of samples of steel cords,giving values of RSD′s (n=6) in the range of 0.15%-4.0% and the results obtained were in consistency with the values obtained by volumetric method.