As I wended my way through my formative years, my parents regularly released truisms to underscore life’s lessons. My father loved positing abstract adages for me to ponder. We would trade interpretations until a semblance of the message would ring true in my developing mind. One axiom I never forgot was, “Can a bad tree bear good fruit?”
This concept has surfaced repeatedly throughout my career in the coatings field. A finisher facing trouble with corrosion resistance, blistering, peeling, impact resistance or color often would consider the coating as a probable cause of the defect. My mind would always take a couple steps back, recalling the words from my youth. Was the substrate adequately prepared? Was the surface completely clean and pretreated before the coating was applied? Was the finisher properly maintaining the cleaning/pretreatment system?
All too often, “the coating problem” is a substrate issue. A coating technologist cannot overemphasize the need to perform acceptable substrate preparation prior to applying the finish. In keeping with this philosophy, this issue features a number of articles dedicated to pretreating surfaces before they are coated. A plasma-based pretreatment process for plastics (alliteration at its best) can be found on pp. 18-21. A novel cleaning technique using dry ice is presented on pp. 22-29. And an environmentally friendly chemical stripper for removing powder coatings is discussed on pp. 32-34.
We also bring you the latest technology for electrocoat filtration, quick color change on powder application lines, robotic painting, antimicrobial finishes and aerospace corrosion resistant coatings.
To assist you further in your quest to eliminate coatings defects and embrace the latest in coatings technology, Finishing Today and our sister publication, Paint and Coatings Industry (PCI), are hosting two valuable events in June. On June 11-12 Powder Coating 101 will be held at the Hyatt Regency O’Hare in Chicago. This in-depth course covers formulating fundamentals and powder performance. (See www.powdercoatingpcimag.com for details.) The 10th annual Coatings for Plastics Symposium will be held on June 13-15 at the same venue. This year we are expanding our coverage beyond automotive applications to include the appliance, construction and architectural industries. (See www.coatingsforplastics.com.)
Whether you’re trying to determine if your substrate has become a “bad tree” causing defects in your operation or simply need to nourish your own roots, we’ve got you covered. If there are other topics you would like to see addressed in future issues of Finishing Today or future conferences, please e-mail me at editor@finishingtodaymag.com. I’d love to hear from you.
