Editor Sam Street tried her hand at spray painting courtesy of PPG and has formed some firm views on working conditions.
I spent the day at PPG yesterday being educated in the ways of waterborne paints and how to spray them by John Hristias, refinish business support specialist.
It was a warm spring day but not boiling. In the short space of time that I spent 'suited up' in the spray booth I had some thoughts on the spray painting profession.
First of all if I were a spray painter I would insist on having an airconditioned suit.
After only 15 minutes in the booth I felt like all my moisture molecules had been sucked into the filter. Now clearly this isn't a new idea – although I did have something a little more high tech in mind than the following short video at the History Channel you can click through to.
Next, the provision of plunge pools for spray painters should be mandatory (except in chillier Tasmania and some mountainous regions where a hot tub might be more appropriate).
As I suspected it's really not as easy as you all make it look – which will be why it takes four years of training. If for no other reason, I won't be joining the spray painting profession because I hate washing up. Cleaning a spray gun after using it for solvent-based paints on a daily basis is enough to put me off. John demonstrated how easy it is to clean the spray gun inbetween colours of waterborne paints (see video below). If you haven't converted to waterborne yet, this should be reason enough to do so (John did also tell me about some other environmental, operational and financial reasons as well).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ou9rDo187zs
Despite visiting many paint and panel shops I had never seen the painting process from start to refinish - it was all a bit of a mystery. John was just giving me a broad demonstration on practice panels, but it gives me some idea of the work and attention to detail needed to restore a real customer's panel and even more respect for what is achieved every day in bodyshops.
My time at PPG was research for our feature on refinish technology for the next issue of the magazine. If you have any specific questions or subjects that you would like to see covered in this magazine feature please email me: Samstreet@yaffa.com.au
Many thanks to PPG's talented trainer John Hristias for giving up a whole day of his time.