Use for Palladium

Before you invest, you want to know the use of palladium, right? Palladium has many uses and many, many more are possible, making it the "sleeper" precious metal. I'll give you the shorthand version of uses of palladium, then I'll give you a link or two with the technical terms about palladium uses.


An obvious use of palladium is in coins. We have Canada Maple Leaf Palladium 1 oz coins and Pamp Suisse palladium bullion. Russian Ballerina palladium coins and Chinese Panda 1 oz coins are also popular. There are many more.

Another use for palladium is jewelry. Everyone wants gold jewelry, but some don't like the color (and others don't like the price!). Some people go for silver, but you'd be a pretty lousy husband to give your wife a cheap silver necklace or bracelet! Platinum costs more than gold, but, it may cost TOO much! So, we have a good use for palladium: a platinum substitute! If gold is $1000, platinum might be a hefty $2000, silver a cheap $10, but palladium, will fall perfectly at around $500. Give or take, sure, but if you give the give of palladium, it will be pretty, not fade, and last a lifetime.

I had a run-in this week for another palladium use: spark plugs! I live near AutoZone, but before going in I looked online to see what was available. Here, I'll show you the pics and even give you the link to AutoZone's spark plug page.

Single electrode palladium-gold mix spark plug

Yes, the above spark plug, folks, uses palladium mixed with gold. Some people swore by them, but they stopped making them and replaced them with platinum. Why? I didn't look that up yet! They make several kinds now, some with 2 and even 4 electrodes! They make platinum and even iridium!

Double electrode platinum and quadruple electrode iridium spark plugs.

And what did I buy? You guessed it, the single electrode $2.99 platinum! The iridium seemed cool because I've never owned anything iridium before, but it's not worth $7.99. I don't think dual or quad electrodes make much of a difference anyway. In the spark plug world, while they're using platinum cheap, they have no use for palladium. You'll see them again though, I'm sure!

Another use of palladium is in catalytic converters. These are included in all cars and include platinum, rhodium, and palladium. I believe platinum is the main ingredient, but they are likely to start using palladium more because it's cheaper. Just another of many uses for palladium.

Dentistry, electronics, mobile phones, and plating of various jewelery are also among the uses of palladium. Palladium is extremely rare, 30 times as rare as gold, and even rarer than platinum. More and more car companies are making cars with fuel cells: they need palladium.

So, that's my quick explanation for the use of palladium. Check Wikipedia, The Market Oracle, and any of the other sites for info. Thanks for reading!