After sheet metal parts are machined, fabricated, stamped, welded or otherwise processed, many are finished with electrostatic industrial powder coating at our full-service Greenwood, SC facility. We offer quality and durable commercial powder coating to meet your strict specifications. With the capabilities of our powder coating plant, large and small parts can be processed quickly and efficiently. Our experienced team can help extend the life of any metal part with abrasive- and chip-resistant paint. Other parts require an electroplated finish and Monti has inhouse plating lines for Silver, Tin, and Zinc finishes. For small parts, we can barrel plate and larger parts can be rack plated.
What is powder coating?
The method of powder coating uses a spray gun, which applies an electrostatic charge to the paint powder particles. The particles are sprayed through the gun and drawn to the grounded part. The parts then enter a heated oven where the coating chemically reacts and bonds to the substrate using a process called cross-linking. This cross-linking process is what creates such a durable, long lasting, even finish.
Benefits of Powder Coating
- Powder Coating has a durable, thicker finish than liquid coatings and is typically applied in one application.
- Powder Coating is resistant to scratches, cracking, peeling, UV rays, and rust.
- Powder Coating finishes are easier and faster to apply than liquid coatings
- Powder Coating comes in many different colors and textures
- Powder Coating is more consistent than liquid coatings as colors and textures are designed into the powder composition and not custom mixed with potential variations by adding solvents, catalysts, additional required additives, etc. The cross-linking bond evenly distributes the finish horizontally and vertically reducing runs and application errors.
- Powder Coat powders do not contain harmful chemicals such as solvents or volatile organic compounds (VOC) that are often found in liquid coatings.
- Powder Coating is safer for the environment and our employees.
- Powder Coat lines that operate automatic reclaim systems can utilize 95% of the powder sprayed by capturing and reusing the overspray powder. This increases the efficiency of the powder while reducing cost. Liquid coatings can lose up to 65% through overspray, which increases your filter usage as well as VOC’s.
Monti’s Industrial Powder Coating Line
- Monti Greenwood has Powder Coated internally since 2005. We started off by Powder Coating low volume parts using racks and an 8ft oven.
- As our business grew, we started outsourcing the Powder Coating of our high-volume parts, while continuing to batch coat our smaller volume parts internally.
- Outsourcing our Powder Coating created many issues for us. Now that we control the entire process, we have eliminated the issues we were getting below.
- Quality Defects. Finish issues, Contaminants, Hook Marks, Orange Peel, Scratched and Scuffed surfaces, Poor Adhesion, Poor Packaging, Wrong color. These defects resulted in hundreds of hours of sorting and containment events all while impacting our customers delivery schedule.
- Returned shipments with part numbers labeled incorrectly
- Poor communication on Lead-Times, continually late
- Wrong part counts
- Wrong Colors
- Eliminating outsource freight cost
- If you are having the above issues with your Manufacturer or Powder Coating source, let our expert Powder Coating staff be your solution.
Competitive Powder Coating options
Monti has multiple options to add value on how we process your Powder Coated parts. Monti can handle both high-volume and single piece orders. Based on volume and size, we will choose the most competitive option for your needs using our list of options below.
Monti, Inc can choose the best approach for your project large or small, from single piece powder coating to powder coating and packaging 36,000 parts per day.
- Automated Line, Fully Automated Spray booth with Reclaim System (Max Part Size: 2ft x 4ft x 8ft long)- 8 Automated Gema Guns (coating)2 Manual Gema Spray Guns (touch-up)
- Automated Line, Manual Spray to Waste booth (Max Part Size: 2ft x 4ft x 8ft long)
- Manual Gema Spray Guns
- Manual Batch System (Max Part Size: 8ft x 8ft x 14ft long)
Zirconium Pre-Treatment in Powder Coating
Monti uses Zirconium chemistry (nanotechnology) to pretreat our material before powder coating.
Zirconium is a phosphate-free, nonhazardous chemistry. It is used to prepare material substrates for cross-linking with powder coating. Zirconium is greater than 90% efficient in this process, leaving very little sludge. Zirconium is designed to be used on all three substrates; steel, aluminum and galvanized. Zirconium is also typically approved for discharge in public systems
Iron phosphate chemistry is typically a hazardous chemistry used to prepare material substrates for powder coating. Phosphates reaction to metal are less than 40% efficient, thus producing large amounts of sludge. Most Iron phosphates can only produce quality finishes on ferrous substrates containing iron. Most local municipalities limit or restrict discharging of phosphates into their public systems.
Our Powder Coat system encompasses a Zero-Discharge Zirconium system. This reduces our ecological footprint to the environment by eliminating any wash and chemical discharging by utilizing an evaporator system instead. Also, most systems require a constant overflow rate of incoming water to replenish bath life. Our wash system does not require any constant incoming flow rates due to the chemistry we use which is formulated for Zero-Discharge systems. Not only does the Zero-Discharge system make a positive impact to the environment, it also helps keep our Powder Coat pricing more competitive.
Can a 4-stage Zirconium system can outperform a 6-stage phosphate system.
Yes, but it depends on what substrates you are coating and how aggressive your wash system will need to be. Zirconium treatment is the newest advancement in pretreatment technology for Powder Coating wash systems. Zirconium is so effective on both ferrous and non-ferrous substrates; it can eliminate the additional rinse stages and sealer stages that are in 6 stage phosphate systems. Many 6 stage systems are designed with an acid cleaner stage, phosphate stage, sealer stage, and multiple rinse stages. Monti’s 4 stage wash line does not require an aggressive acid or sealer to effectively cross-link and bond the powder to the substrate.
Highest Quality Powder Coating
Monti’s Powder Coating system is driven by our Monti Quality System. Our quality system is guided by strict process controls and certified by ISO 9001:2015 standards. Highlights to our processes are noted below.
- Our system was designed and built with some of the best powder coating equipment available in today’s market.
- Our employees are continually trained and include Gema certified technicians.
- Our equipment is constantly calibrated at specific cycles to ensure accurate and controlled measurements.
- Parts are electronically scheduled and tracked with our ERP system, ensuring on time delivery.
- Parts are visually inspected prior to unloading. Our visual inspection areas are well-lit using multiple 5,200 lumen lights.
- Parts are packaged with piece of mind. We rarely have instances where products were damaged due to poor packaging.
- Finish parts are accurately counted, in some cases verified with a weigh count label system.
- Powder quantities are routinely cycle counted and updated to maintain accurate powder inventory levels, preventing stock-out scenarios.
- Powder is applied and stored in a climate controlled environmental room.
- Our process controls are thorough, including:
- Chemical range testing and sampling of all 4-stages, taken daily
- Powder Mil thickness validation, per ASTM D7091, taken daily or more often
- MEK rub test cure validation, per ASTM D5402, taken daily
- Cross hatch adhesion test, per ASTM D3359-B, taken daily
- 600hr and 1,000hr salt spray testing, taken yearly or more often, including
- ASTM B117 per UL-1332 requirements
- Film thickness per ASTM D7091-05
- Scribe creepage per ASTM D1654-08, Procedure A, Method 1
- Rust grade determination per ASTM D610-01
- Blister size and frequency per ASTM D714-02
- ASTM allows a range for passing testing. Our ratings have always fallen within range per UL-1332, typically scoring the highest quality rating of 10, the highest rating possible.
Powder Coating Finishes and Textures
Powder coat formulations and options has exploded over the past several years. Nowadays, you can achieve most finish options and textures in a single coat. The options include:
Gloss factors that range from low gloss to high gloss and even matte finishes
Textures such as sand, vein, wrinkle, and river.
Specialized powders such as transparent, metallic, chrome, sparkle, clear coat powders.
2 coat powder coat processes such as a transparent red sparkle over super chrome, which can give the final appearance of a red chrome with sparkle.
Monti has powder coated all the above examples