My first ever powdercoat

[chromesphere]

That's a pretty good first attempt muddy.  Seriously you should have seen mine 

I was considering getting a pc fan with low CFM to gently presude the excess dust away from the enclosure and....ahhh....into a bag!?  Or possibly even a dust buster.  Cut out a slot in the plastic tub that I spray into and turn it on before I start spraying. Then off again when im finished.  Im paranoid about dust as both my cars have been totally covered in it a number of times and its an absolute PITA to remove it from the cars bonnet as the bonnet heat kind of melts it and it sticks!  That was back when I was ultra careless / clueless with pc'ing though.

[wgc]

Cure schedule, with attention to ramp time

Is it ok (since the oven is still somewhat hot from the prebaking) to just keep the oven on and put freshly powdered pedal in there (so basically no ramp time, straight to the max heat)? Would it help or make things worse?

It takes a few minutes for the metal to hit cure temp. So I set the oven to cure temp and the part goes in at that temp.  With wrinkle powders, I set it hotter to account for opening the door, and then reset to cure temp once it's in. You lose some heat opening the door, arranging the part, etc and wrinkles don't like extended ramp times.

I'm not a pro but I never heard of coating your part and putting in a cold oven.   Makes no sense.

Also I'd avoid a vacuum while spraying in a small space, the exhaust will probably just create a mess, esp if you don't have a hepa filter in place. Powder is flammable so watch for any source of sparks or flame. Honestly you might be better off outside if not too windy!  But I know the challenges of tight living conditions well.

But soon enough you'll want to powder coat everything!  Might be a way to get the neighbors good side too if you can pc something for them.

[muddyfox]

I was considering getting a pc fan with low CFM to gently presude the excess dust away from the enclosure and....ahhh....into a bag!? 

Did you actually go through with this? This would be kinda doable.

Since you coat in your garage and with cars in I'm sure it's not pharmacy clean, how do you keep the crap out of the finish? Last movie of yours I've seen you were spraying into that big metal bucket, not much finish protection?

[muddyfox]

It takes a few minutes for the metal to hit cure temp. So I set the oven to cure temp and the part goes in at that temp.  With wrinkle powders, I set it hotter to account for opening the door, and then reset to cure temp once it's in. You lose some heat opening the door, arranging the part, etc and wrinkles don't like extended ramp times.

I only have access to plain RAL colors but I'll try to remember this. Makes sense.

Honestly you might be better off outside if not too windy!  But I know the challenges of tight living conditions well.

Not doable... it's an apartment building and I don't see anyone taking kindly to me schlepping the compressor from the storage just to make a mess up front for everyone to enjoy. 

But soon enough you'll want to powder coat everything!  Might be a way to get the neighbors good side too if you can pc something for them.

It's a bunch of old geezers, noone would have any use for my mad koatin skillz. But you are right, I do find myself eyeing what's a good candidate for pc once I get the hang of it! 

[peAk]

awesome job, muddy!

[muddyfox]

Thanks man!

Hopefully I'll get the little things sorted out soon. Nothing really wrong with them as they are now (as the second one is much better than the first one in the pictures), I'm just a bit OCD about certain things when it's obvious they can actually be better with a little more effort. 

[muddyfox]

Alright here's tonight's effort. One B and one BB in some undefined white color (got some sample powder when I bought the gun), done at the same time. Got pretty cramped in that tiny oven but worked out fine.









Observations:

- Preheated the enclosures for good 15 minutes before coating. Honestly didn't notice any difference in coat quality. If anything, there's two suspect dimples on the B box that look exactly what I imagine escaping gas trapped under liquid powdercoat would look.
- Cleaning the boxes with acetone is a PITA. However much I scrub, there's always black stuff coming off. Anything better to degrease/clean with? Naphta? Brake cleaner? Isopropyl?
- there's definitely dust in my oven. There was no debris in the powder yet a few specks in the final finish. That said, I think I may be overreacting. They ARE pedals that live on the ground, get tossed into bags, and get stomped on.  Not sure that a pristine finish is all that important to start with! Once the label is on there noone will be able to tell a dustspeck here and there. I'm actually amazed there's so few of them, given where I work.
- put the parts in the fully preheated oven, waited till powder turned to liquid and baked for 15 minutes. No issues with the process itself.
- no pooling on the bottom and nice edge coverage. Liking it a lot.
- the coat is obviously thinner than the first two pedals. I might try some more powder to get a thicker layer. More experimentation in order.

The box is predrilled to host Jacob's testing rig. It will probably take a while to box but I'll hopefully get there in a month or three. 

[catfud]

Nice white paintjob! I recently drilled something very similar...

[catfud]

(oops, removed double-post)

[chromesphere]

Hey Muddy,

Still haven't worked that one out yet. I always end up with some dust / crude on the surface.  Its usually only slight so I don't fuss too much over it though.  I don't outgas, I just wipe the enclosure with a dry clean cloth to make sure there isn't excess dust on it then blow some air over it.  I still get some dust particles though.  Like you said, its a garage   Haven't tried the pc fan or dustbuster sorry.  Its actually probably unnecessary as far as overspray goes anyway.  I'm pretty careful with the pc dust these days and apply it at a more controlled flow rate instead of bellowing clouds

That metal tub was a dumb idea.  I mention it in my 'powder coat update' video.  It causes deflection which prevents the powder from clinging to the sides of the enclosure.  Don't even place your enclosures on a metal tray when your spraying.  in fact You want as little grounded metal as possible near your enclosure when your spraying it.  A different issue ("deflection") to what your having but that lesson was the biggest for me to learn so I thought I would explain it.

Paul

[wgc]

Looks good!  Make sure that if you acetone after pre baking that you leave enough time for it to evaporate. It can suck into those nice empty pores from pre baking and then cause little craters during cure. Acetone and powder don't like each other.

Might be worth putting back in the oven for a few mins after acetone.

Sometimes I think the dust is from whatever you're wearing and happens while placing in the oven. Any residual charge (corona?) on your clothes would make a grounded box really appealing. I get it sometimes too.

You can sand it with 1500/2000 grit and then polish but I never do. If you're using a decal and envirotx might be worth it.

Love seeing the other tips here, lots of great info!

[muddyfox]

I thought the whole point of prebaking was to get rid of excess moisture, acetone included. For this white run I acetone'd (is that even a word?  ) the box, prebaked it and then sprayed right after it was cold enough to handle. So I guess I was kinda hotflocking it?
So this time I prebaked it and put the powdered box in a hot oven. Like I said, no visible difference in finish to my last yellow attempt when I didn't prebake and put it in a cold oven. This kind of fuzziness to input parameters messes with my mind. Is nothing sacred in this process? 

Do all y'all use acetone for cleaning/degreasing?
Also, I've found that nitrile gloves do help with oil stains but they also pick up box dirt like there's no tomorrow. I start cleaning the box and the gloves pick up so much crap that it just gets right back on the box from all the handling. I'd need a dozen gloves just to get all of it off! Maybe presoak in some other solvent?

[wgc]

Yeah, that's right- I read it that you used acetone after prebaking.

I tend to use simple green for degreasing, with a brush or scotchbrite pad.

I spray at room temperature unless I have a hard time with faraday or a two part and the second coat just doesn't ground that well.   Keep in mind one of the great things about powder is if you are not hot flocking, it's easy to remove powder and respray before it goes in the oven.

There are times when you break all the rules and it comes out fine. There are also times you can follow all the rules and it's screwed up.  Keep in mind that it might look fine but be more prone to chipping.

Best thing you can do now is practice on scrap parts, soda cans, etc and arrive at a process that works for you and your equipment.

[wgc]

...And have fun with it!   

[muddyfox]

Yeah, I hear that's what it's all about! 

About chipping, time will tell. I've already dropped them a couple times  and no marks so far.

Thanks for the input. I guess I need to stick to a procedure and see if any problems occur down the line, act accordingly.