Powder Coated Tough - Spring 2008 - (Page 43) Pretreatment chemical supplier Atotech USA’s banner hangs above the five-stage washer on Carolinas Custom Clad’s automatic line. The companies’ unique relationship has proved to be mutually beneficial. appearance that is just as uniform as a conditioned Zn phosphate, while occupying only one stage, which he notes uniform Zn phosphate typically require separate proprietary steps. Kochilla says that this particular product also is suitable for multiple substrates, including Fe, Al, Mg and Zn (EG/Plated/Hot Dip), without adjusting the solution parameters. Third, Atotech demonstrated that its dry in place organic phosphate replacement can replace an iron phosphate without affecting the metal surfaces appearance. “This is ideal for clearcoat applications,” Kochilla says. “This product also can be placed on top of conversion coatings (phosphates and zirconates) to enhance pretreatment performance.” The product does not require a rinse and it operates at room temperature, he adds. “Finally,” Kochilla says, “we demonstrated the concept of [our process, which] allows more flexibility for a custom coater. A custom coater can apply three different pretreatments from only a five-stage washer. The coater can switch between different pretreatments with the push of a button.” From Kochilla’s perspective, the benefits of Atotech’s relationship with Carolinas Custom Clad are many. “The worldwide training center for our growing PST organization is in Rock Hill, S.C. CCC is often utilized for training our own employees on powder coating facilities as well as our observing and operating our new products. The advantages over doing this in a commercial and realistic setting instead of a laboratory or applications laboratory are too numerous to list,” he says. He goes on to say that all Atotech technologies must be validated through a strict product development process prior to market launch. “This process requires scale up and validation in commercial settings, among other steps. The development process is standard procedure for companies following stage gate product development procedures.” Wright says of the relationship with Atotech, “We’re a small business, but we have a very sophisticated organization in the form of a pretreatment chemical supplier at our disposal. They, in some ways, have become an extension of our organization. We have the resources of their lab, their technical people, their quality and ISO-type resource management people, which has been extremely beneficial to us in pursuing automotive and appliance business.” www.powdercoating.org 43 http://www.datapaq.com http://www.datapaq.com http://www.powdercoating.org
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