Powder coating is an advanced
method of applying a decorative and protective finish to a wide
range of materials and products that are used by both industries
and consumers. The powder used for the process is a mixture of
finely ground particles of pigment and resin, which is sprayed
onto a surface to be coated. The charged powder particles adhere
to the electrically grounded surfaces until heated and fused into
a smooth coating in a curing oven. The result is a uniform, durable,
high-quality, and attractive finish. Powder coating is the fastest-growing
finishing technology in North America, representing over 20% (and
quickly growing!) of all industrial finishing applications.
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* More Durable
Powder coating gives consumers, businesses, and industry one of
the most economical, longest-lasting, and most color-durable quality
finishes available.
Powder coated surfaces are more resistant to chipping, scratching,
fading, and wearing than other finishes. Color selection is virtually
unlimited with high and low gloss, metallic, and clear finishes
available. And colors stay bright and vibrant longer. Texture
selections range from smooth surfaces to a wrinkled or matte finish,
and rough textures designed for hiding surface imperfections.
* What about the environment?
The powder coating process itself offers another advantage—it’s
environmentally friendly—virtually pollution free! Powder coating
is highly protective of our environment. While liquid finishes
contain solvents which have pollutants known as volatile organic
compounds (VOCs), powder coating contains no solvents and releases
negligible amounts, if any, of VOCs into the atmosphere. Thus,
there is no longer a need for finishers to buy costly pollution
control equipment.
* Saves Money
Elimination of VOCs and reduction of wastes saves money and helps
companies comply more easily and economically with the regulations
of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
In fact, one of the major elements in expanding the market for
powder coating has been the implementation over the past 30 years
of stringent air pollution control legislation.
* It Looks Like Paint But It Acts Like Armor
It's tough. It looks great. And it lasts a long, long time. Powder
coating is a superior finish that's found on hundreds of products
you come in contact with each day. It makes products durable,
attractive, and scratch-resistant, too.
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The powder coatings are applied using a specialized powder coating
spray gun. This unique spray gun has an adjustable electrostatic
corona charge of between 10,000-90,000 volts with a negative ion
orientation. This is similar to the way dust sticks to your television
screen, except that we supercharge the dust (in this case, the
powder), causing the coating to stick to the parts!
For the complete process of powder
coating, click here!
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As the powder passes through the spray gun, the powder is given
a negative electrical charge. The part to be powder coated is
grounded or positive. Powder exits the spray gun in a fog like
fashion and is attracted to the positive (grounded) part. This
is one of the major differences between wet and dry paint. Wet
paint is blown onto a part with a lot of pressure; powder is sprayed
with low pressure causing the fog (Cloud) to be gently “pulled”
to the part. The advantage is the fog reaches all recessed areas
(like between the fins of a head, providing a more complete and
uniform layer), which results in a smooth finish typically without
the runs, sags, light spots, etc., that can occur with wet paint.
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Sandblasting ‘etches’ the surface of the metal, creating a solid
mechanical bond adhesion during the curing process. It also cleanses
the metal. We use very fine angular aluminum oxide media because
it gives the best results for powder coating adhesion. Picture
in your mind that they type of etch this media leaves behind would
be similar to ‘sharp peaks (hills) and valleys’.
Glass beading uses a round glass media that ‘pocks’ the surface
other than impinging the surface. This kind of media is used more
for aesthetic purposes than functional uses. Glass bead media
does not provide the best ‘anchor tooth’ for best powder coating
adhesion. Glass beading a surface (especially aluminum) reflects
the light to your eyes better, and makes metal appear whiter or
brighter.
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If your parts are chrome plated, we will sandblast the top layer
of chrome away, leaving the copper and nickel layers. We will
then check the part and the integrity of the remaining layers
by pre-baking. Doing this will make sure the remaining layers
of copper and nickel are well adhered to the substrate.
Providing that the sandblasting and oven temperatures don’t cause
‘blistering’, or lifting of the copper and nickel, we will then
powder coat right over it.
If the remaining chrome plating (copper and nickel) do blister,
we are forced to have the parts reverse plated to remove all platings
and back to bare metal. Blistering occurs less than 10% of the
time, so we do not suggest spending the money for the reverse
plating process until we have checked the parts to see if that
process is necessary.
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Leave this up to us! We
do not like to coat over anything on the parts already (especially
primer!) so don’t waste your time or money trying to "get it ready".
Powder coating is no different from any other "compliant" coating.
What that means is that when the Clean Air Act went into effect,
many of the older paints that had a lot of solvent (high VOC)
in them were no longer able to be used. These older, high solvent
paints, had the ability to "cut through" thin layers of oil or
soil and bond to the metal. As newer coatings were introduced
such as water based, high solids/low solvent, powder and E-coat
it quickly became apparent that these coatings required very clean
substrates for good adhesion and performance. Powders are not
unique, but they do require a clean
surface as does any modern coating.
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Any objects made from metal (aluminum, steel, brass, copper, bronze,
titanium, magnesium, etc.) can be powder coated. All of these
metals, weather sand, die, investment casting, extruded, forged,
and of course billet metals can be powder coated. Low density
cast parts may require additional handling and possibly surface
restoration by the experienced technicians at Andrews Powder Coating.
Some of the items that we powder coat include: patio and indoor
furniture, decorative architectural pieces, car, boat, plane,
bicycle and motorcycle parts (including chassis, frames and exhaust
systems), wrought iron gates and fencing, birdcages, wheels, plumbing
and lighting fixtures, railings, hand rails, metal cabinetry (i.e.
medicine cabinets, etc), appliances (front and side panels of
ranges and refrigerators, washer tops and lids, dryer drums, air
conditioner cabinets, water heaters, dishwasher racks, cavities
of microwave ovens), and more!
Click here for a larger list!
Yes, Andrews Powder Coating has experience coating non-conductive
materials such as glass, abs/nylon plastics, ceramics and porcelain.
New curing processes for powder that are under development now
will, in the near future, allow powder coatings to be applied
to wood and even common plastics. Currently, there are unique
specifically designed powder coatings manufactured for medium
density overlay (MDO) and medium density fiberboard (MDF) products
such as speaker cabinets and large production cabinetry applications.
Generally, powder coating typical wood products at this time is
not practical or recommended.
Surface restoration services are possible using a combination
of welding/brazing and proprietary filing composites. Our technicians
have many years experience in working with these “liquid metal”
filing agents. They are difficult to use and must be used at correct
temperatures. Non-metallic body fillers, such as “Bondo” cannot
be used prior to powder coating any part.
Powder coating is applied thicker than liquid paint (usually 3-4
mills compared to 1-2 mils) and powder coated surfaces are more
resistant to chipping, scratching, fading, and wearing than liquid
paint and other finishes. Powder coating is more versatile than
liquid paint, and can be used on springs without cracking the
coating. You can’t do that with paint!
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Powder coating is like painting your car, you may be able to do
it your self but you will not get the quality or durability of
an experienced shop. An experienced shop will have all the right
tools to get the best possible quality job. The hobby guns you
see only charge the particles to 10kv, even if that much. It takes
a lot more electrostatic charge to correctly get a proper finish
with quality that will last and look the best. The industrial
type guns charge particles from 30kv-100kv, and also charge in
different ways for different applications. I have seen it mentioned
to use a kitchen oven; there is no way to keep correct process
controlled temperatures with a kitchen oven. You will not get
uniform heating and curing, which the quality and durability will
not be there. The powder coating will not hold up as long, so
in the long run you will spend more money and time with having
to re-powder the part because of fading, chipping, etc that is
caused from improper curing and improper application.
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NEVER. All of our powder is 100% virgin powder. Reclaimed powder
can introduce all kinds of defects and contamination. The powders
we use are some of the best on the market and are stored in a
cool 65 degree environment at all times.
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With powder coating, color selection is virtually unlimited with
high and low gloss, metallic, and clear finishes available. Colors
stay bright and vibrant longer. Texture selections range from
smooth surfaces to a wrinkled or matte finish, and rough textures
designed for hiding surface imperfections are also available.
Common formulations applied at Andrews Powder Coating include
epoxies, hybrids, urethanes, polyesters and acrylics.
Standard coatings commonly used include fluorescent, metallic,
textured, hammertone, wrinkle, candy color/transparents, and of
course all old world standard color finishes. All of these are
available in flat, matte, semi and high gloss.
If you’re looking for something different, we are now applying
Reflectra, a chrome look-alike powder coating! Reflectra is not
as reflective as real chrome, however, it is still very bright.
The look is similar to satin polished aluminum. We also apply
coatings that are electro statically dissipative (ESD), electrically
conductive, voltage insulating and phosphorescent (glow in the
dark!!).
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Virtually any color, texture and gloss level can be custom matched.
Due to the process involved in manufacturing powder resin, custom
colors can be expensive unless the requirement is large.
Click here to see all about color
selection!
Yes! We offer clear powder coatings that can be applied over polished
brass, aluminum and stainless – such as wheels, plumbing fixtures
and lighting fixtures! We also offer an industrial strength clear
powder coating that can withstand very harsh cleaning solvents
(such as Methyl Ethyl Ketone ‘MEK’ and acetone). These types of
clear coatings can be applied over silk screened/pad printed parts
or panels to protect the graphics.
Many of the motorcycle enthusiasts polish the lip of their rims
and powder the centers one color, and clear the entire rim for
that eternal polished look!
The oven temperature is low enough to avoid any metal fatigue
or retemperment. We have powder coated automotive and leaf coil
springs for hundreds of customers over the last twenty years without
incident.
Powder coating costs about the same as other professionally applied
paints or coatings on small projects, and can often be substantially
less expensive on larger quantities of parts. Some bulk plating
processes similar to anodizing may be slightly less expensive.
More decorative finishes, such as chrome plating, are substantially
more expensive than powder coating.
The problem with listing items
on price lists is that it does not reflect the pricing on having
more than one part at a time powder coated. For example a single
head will cost about $165 to be powder coated, a pair of heads
about $235 (cylinders are the same), but to have 2 heads and 2
cylinders powder coated the same color at the same time is only
about $400 for Standard Colors or $600 for 2 stage, Candy Colors
or cylinders with polished fins.
Pricing is determined by our
labor, material and power costs, with the main expense being the
cost to operate the ovens to cure the powder. Next on the expense
list is labor with it taking more time to change colors than to
spray them. The equipment and the spray room have to be spotless
as a few specks of powder from one color can ruin the next color.
So the more parts sprayed per color and the more parts cured at
one time, the lower our costs are which lowers your cost.
The most cost effective way to
have powder coating done is by having a number of pieces done
at one time. We are used to customers combining orders with others
and sending parts from several motorcycles at one time. We encourage
this as it allows us to give you the highest quality powder coating
at the best possible price.
To see our basic price lists,
click here!
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Once you have your precious parts powder coated, you will never
be able to have repairs (chips, scratches, etc.) redone in powder,
without tanking it apart, stripping and recoating. You can have
a small touch up kit made by your local automotive paint supplier
"made to match" as close as possible. Remember, special effect
powders will not be able to be duplicated! To make life easier,
we suggest having a 3"x5" or 4"x6" "Q" panel as they are called
in the trade, or flat piece of metal coated at the same time as
your parts. We will write the powder manufacturers company name,
part number and color name on the panel for future reference,
(i.e. Tiger Drylac Bengal Black 549/88888). Save this panel! Take
it to an automotive paint tinter for a touch up kit. Many of them
use color computers today and this is the easiest way to get the
match.
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Andrews Powder Coating has been in the custom powder coating industry
since 1980. Although many large companies send their work to us
to be powder coated, we still consider ourselves a custom facility,
and not a high run production shop. We carefully examine each
and every piece by hand several times during the powder coating
process. We provide services that other powder coating services
either do not know how to provide, or will not provide. We pride
ourselves on the difficult and often tedious masking and preparation
situations we are presented with! If you would like a special
transparent or candy color for your piece, it is not a problem!
We also do not have a minimum piece order.
We credit all of our customers (large and small) for the choices
they make when choosing a powder coater. They know that by taking
their parts to Andrews Powder Coating, they will get their parts
done correctly the first time, saving valuable time and aggravation.
To meet the staff, click here!
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If you are located nearby and wish to drop parts off to us, our
offices are open Monday through Friday from 8 AM PST until 5 PM
PST. To better
accommodate your schedule, we have newly extended our shipping
and receiving hours, starting at 6:00AM!
Andrews Powder Coating, Inc. also offers pick up and delivery
services. If you are put of the area, out of state, or even out
of the country, we recommend using UPS, FedEx, or US Priority
Mail to get your parts to us. Our experts in shipping will carefully
package up your parts when they are finished and return them to
you safe and sound, undamaged!
