AI exposure: Plating Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders, Metal and Plastic
Set up, operate, or tend plating machines to coat metal or plastic products with chromium, zinc, copper, cadmium, nickel, or other metal to protect or decorate surfaces. Typically, the product being coated is immersed in molten metal or an electrolytic solution.
Reading this score
computedAt 12.6% of weighted task load, Plating Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders, Metal and Plastic sits at the 20th percentile, below the point where a job's centre of gravity has moved. 80.4% of what this role does is untouched, meaning current systems cannot produce that work at all, whatever the commercial incentive.
What holds the line here is embodiment. Across this occupation's 33 tasks it averages 2.79 out of 3, the highest of the five friction dimensions. In plain terms, the work has to happen in physical space. A language model cannot move matter. Until the robotics to do this work is both good enough and cheap enough to deploy widely, capability in software does not reach it.
The most exposed thing this job does is Maintain production records, at 73.3%. The least is Position containers to receive parts, and load or unload materials in containers, at 0.0%. A gap of 73.3% between two parts of the same job is the reason this index publishes at task level. An occupation-wide number would have hidden both.
Within production occupations, this one is less exposed than the median of 16.2% across the group's 107 roles, with 66 scoring higher. Being in an exposed family does not make a particular job exposed, and the reverse holds too.
What would move this score. Of 33 tasks, 3 are currently banded exposed, 0 assisted and 30 untouched. For that distribution to shift materially would take robotics cheap and reliable enough to deploy at scale, not a better language model. The score is re-computed every quarter against a fresh capability reference, and the change is published rather than quietly applied.
Where the score comes from
judgedEvery task is scored through the standardised work activities it maps to. These are this occupation’s averages on the six rubric dimensions. Capability is what AI can do; the other five are what stands in the way.
| Dimension | Mean | Scale |
|---|---|---|
| Capability | 0.68 | 0-4 |
| Embodiment | 2.79 | 0-3 |
| Presence | 0.16 | 0-3 |
| Accountability | 0.41 | 0-3 |
| Context | 0.93 | 0-3 |
| Verification cost | 1.00 | 0-3 |
Task by task
33 tasks, O*NET 31.0| Task | Exposed | Assisted | Untouched | Importance | Band |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Maintain production records. | 73.3% | 26.7% | 0.0% | 4.38 | exposed |
| Determine sizes and compositions of objects to be plated, and amounts of electrical current and time required. | 40.0% | 35.0% | 25.0% | 4.21 | exposed |
| Read production schedules to determine setups of equipment and machines. | 30.0% | 20.0% | 50.0% | 4.12 | exposed |
| Observe gauges to ensure that machines are operating properly, making adjustments or stopping machines when problems occur. | 23.8% | 13.8% | 62.5% | 4.38 | untouched |
| Immerse workpieces in coating solutions or liquid metal or plastic for specified times. | 18.3% | 6.7% | 75.0% | 4.65 | untouched |
| Suspend objects, such as parts or molds from cathode rods, or negative terminals, and immerse objects in plating solutions. | 18.3% | 6.7% | 75.0% | 4.10 | untouched |
| Suspend sticks or pieces of plating metal from anodes, or positive terminals, and immerse metal in plating solutions. | 18.3% | 6.7% | 75.0% | 4.06 | untouched |
| Inspect coated or plated areas for defects, such as air bubbles or uneven coverage. | 16.7% | 8.3% | 75.0% | 4.45 | untouched |
| Set up, operate, or tend plating or coating machines to coat metal or plastic products with chromium, zinc, copper, cadmium, nickel, or other metal to protect or decorate surfaces. | 16.7% | 8.3% | 75.0% | 4.44 | untouched |
| Adjust controls to set temperatures of coating substances and speeds of machines and equipment. | 16.7% | 8.3% | 75.0% | 4.01 | untouched |
| Preheat workpieces in ovens. | 15.0% | 10.0% | 75.0% | 2.92 | untouched |
| Mix and test solutions, and turn valves to fill tanks with solutions. | 14.2% | 10.8% | 75.0% | 3.61 | untouched |
| Adjust dials to regulate flow of current and voltage supplied to terminals to control plating processes. | 11.7% | 13.3% | 75.0% | 4.46 | untouched |
| Test machinery to ensure that it is operating properly. | 11.7% | 13.3% | 75.0% | 4.20 | untouched |
| Remove excess materials or impurities from objects, using air hoses or grinding machines. | 8.8% | 3.8% | 87.5% | 4.24 | untouched |
| Immerse objects to be coated or plated into cleaning solutions, or spray objects with conductive solutions to prepare them for plating. | 8.8% | 3.8% | 87.5% | 4.13 | untouched |
| Clean and maintain equipment, using water hoses and scrapers. | 6.7% | 5.8% | 87.5% | 3.74 | untouched |
| Perform equipment maintenance, such as cleaning tanks and lubricating moving parts of conveyors. | 4.8% | 3.5% | 91.7% | 3.39 | untouched |
| Remove objects from solutions at periodic intervals and observe objects to verify conformance to specifications. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 4.38 | untouched |
| Examine completed objects to determine thicknesses of metal deposits, or measure thicknesses by using instruments such as micrometers. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 4.14 | untouched |
| Rinse coated objects in cleansing liquids and dry them with cloths, centrifugal driers, or by tumbling in sawdust-filled barrels. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 4.00 | untouched |
| Measure or weigh materials, using rulers, calculators, and scales. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 4.19 | untouched |
| Measure, mark, and mask areas to be excluded from plating. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 4.16 | untouched |
| Monitor and measure thicknesses of electroplating on component parts to verify conformance to specifications, using micrometers. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 3.97 | untouched |
| Operate hoists to place workpieces onto machine feed carriages or spindles. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 3.93 | untouched |
| Position and feed materials into processing machines, by hand or by using automated equipment. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 3.92 | untouched |
| Position objects to be plated in frames, or suspend them from positive or negative terminals of power supplies. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 3.90 | untouched |
| Operate sandblasting equipment to roughen and clean surfaces of workpieces. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 3.78 | untouched |
| Clean workpieces, using wire brushes. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 3.63 | untouched |
| Replace worn parts and adjust equipment components, using hand tools. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 3.60 | untouched |
| Place plated or coated materials on racks and transfer them to ovens to dry for specified periods of time. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 3.59 | untouched |
| Measure and set stops, rolls, brushes, and guides on automatic feeders and conveying equipment or coating machines, using micrometers, rules, and hand tools. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 3.55 | untouched |
| Position containers to receive parts, and load or unload materials in containers, using dollies or handtrucks. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 3.53 | untouched |
Task text and importance ratings sourced from O*NET 31.0. Shares computed. The occupation score is the importance-weighted mean.
Occupations either side of this one
The four closest scores in the same occupational family, then the four closest anywhere in the index.
Read this carefully. Exposure is not displacement. A high score means current AI systems can produce this work, not that anyone will stop paying a person to do it. Adoption depends on economics, regulation and inertia that this index deliberately does not model. How the score is built.
What this means in practice
Most of this work is not reachable by current systems, so the immediate pressure is on the administrative edges of the role rather than its core: the scheduling, the reporting, the written records. That is where time is recovered.