Powder Coating
Powder Coating is used widely across many industries; although it is a fairly new way of surface finishing it becoming ever popular and used in decorative and protective styles, industrial ovens play an essential part in the process.
What is powder coating?
Powder coating is a process and technique that involves applying dry paint to a specific part; it is applied in usually two kinds of ways. The first is to have the part required to be coated lowered in to fluidised powder which can be electrostatically charged although it doesn`t have to be. The second way is to spray electrostatically charged paint directly on to the part.
Traditional paint on walls and ceilings in homes come in a liquid form must then evaporate to leave a solid coating, powder coated items are not to dissimilar.
Once the coating is applied the part in question is placed in to an industrial oven which heats the product until the powder particles melt and coalesce thus forming a continuous film. It creates a much tougher and harder coating than that of traditional paints.
Preparation
Items that are ready be powder coated must first be prepared, this requires removing of any grease, oil, soil, metal oxides, welding scales any other sort of debris. There are stages of the pre- treatment of items which includes methods using chemicals, the method go in order of:
- Clean (de-grease)
- Etch
- De-smutting
- Rinse
These methods are then followed by the final phosphating or chromating of the item, this will vary on the kind metal that is being treated; aluminium, metal etc. It also vary on it the material to be coated is for interior or exterior use. These methods will improve the ability of the powder bonding with the metal.
Sand blasting techniques can be used if the item to be coated is made from glass, wood or plastic.
Items that are powder coated
Results of powder coating are visible in our everyday lives, kitchen white-wares such as kettles, toasters and deep fat fryers will all have been powder coated. Automotive, Aircraft and other vehicle industries heavily rely on powder coating items such as car doors and aeroplane tails. Industries use state of the art industrial ovens to speed up powder coating.
Industrial ovens
Industrial ovens are chambers that transfer heat to items at a constantly high temperature. They are used to help provide the solid coating after the item has been powder coated. Once the part has been prepared and readied it is placed in to the oven to heat. Fan based air flow or radiant heat will warm the part a pre-set temperature of around 180° C to 210° C. There are a number of different industrial ovens available that do this job. If you are looking for an oven for powder coating you should for:
- Batch ovens
- Shuttle ovens
- Tunnel ovens
- Multi pass ovens
These ovens are provided by a range of manufacturers and can be built at a size and heat transfer temperature to suit your operation.