Powder Coated Tough - Spring 2009 - (Page 35)

a very positive impact on the company’s operations in terms of being able to provide shorter lead times, quality parts, and provide on-time deliveries to its customers, Brand says. Mid-West outsources all other finishing needs, including zinc, chrome, vinyl, galvanizing, e-coat and black oxide. As for the powder line itself, it has 670 ft of Richard & Wilcox zigzag conveyor that runs anywhere from 2 to 20 fpm. The pretreatment system was manufactured by General Fabricators in Sandusky, Ohio, and consists of a three-stage wash with the first stage using a heated cleaner/iron phosphate from Madison Chemical (Madison, Ind.). Stage two is a clean rinse, and stage three is a clean rinse/sealer. A 55-ft dry-off convection oven with Maxon burners operates between 250°F and 330°F, depending on the parts and line speed. The custom-built environmental room houses MW Powder’s two-position manual powder booth, also manufactured by Gen Fab. The booth was purchased with Nordson Surecoat guns and seven Nordson fluidizer hoppers. “We have just in the past year made a switch to Parker-Ionics (Pulse Ionics) manual guns for our booth, mainly for their added transfer efficiency and simplicity of operation,” says Brand, who has been working with Terry Stuber of TWS Industries Inc. (Greenfield, Ind.) since installing the system. “He has been very helpful with not only training and support on the guns, but his many years of wisdom in the industry have been very nice to draw from. He has been very good about helping to keep MW Powder on the right path when issues might arise,” Brand says. TWS has developed a new powder booth with automatic and manual guns at Mid-West’s request, and Brand says the company is in the process of reviewing it for the near future. The two-pass cure oven, which can turn a 14 ft part at the turn, is also a convection oven with Maxon burners and is kept at 400 deg, unless the company is curing with low-temperature curing powders. From there, parts exit the cure oven and circle around for cooling, touch-up, label application if needed, and packing. “We also have our own burn-off oven made by Pollution Control, which allows us to keep our hooks and racks burned-off when needed,” Brand says. www.powdercoating.org colors • textures special effects functionality color consulting & technical service 2nd generation bonded metallics large or small volumes custom colors, fast global partnership any questions? colorworksforyou www.tigerdrylac.com 800.243.8148 35 http://www.tigerdrylac.com http://www.tigerdrylac.com http://www.airblastinc.com http://www.airblastinc.com http://www.powdercoating.org

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Powder Coated Tough - Spring 2009

Powder Coated Tough - Spring 2009 Contents Stay Plugged In Powder Perspective Powder: A Fit Finish A Taste of Coating West 2009 Marking the Mark: Necessity Brings Powder In-House Custom Coasters Corner: Dialing Up Its Own Software Solution Tough Talk Talbert's Technical Corner

Powder Coated Tough - Spring 2009

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