What is powder coating?

Powder coating is a coating method for a high-quality, durable finish, in which is more efficient, and helpful for the environment. Powder coating is available in an almost limitless range of colors and textures, resulting in excellent performance and outcome. Powder coating is a polymer resin base, combined with pigments, flow modifiers, and additives. The elementary idea behind electrostatic powder coating is based on the fact that parts with opposite electrical charges attract each other. Therefore, most conducting, and thermally stable solids are suitable for powder coating. Above all today, metal objects are electrostatically powder coated in an ever increasing volume. The most usual examples are: household appliances, office furniture, garden furniture, automobile accessories, fittings, wire goods, sections, and cladding elements. Daily, everyone comes into contact with the results of this technology. The dry coating powder is filled into a powder hopper, fluidized and conveyed by means of compressed air to the spray gun. A low-voltage of 10 V is converted in the powder gun to high-voltage, according to the cascade principle. One or more electrodes on the front of the powder gun charges the powder to 60 - 100 kV when sprayed. An electric field is created between the powder gun and the grounded workpiece. The powder particles follow these field lines and remain adhered to the object, due to its residual charge. The processed workpieces can then be conveyed either manually or automatically to the curing oven, where the organic powder is melted to a smooth film at 160 - 200° C (320 - 392° F) and then hardened. Because of its chemical characteristics enamel powder requires much higher temperatures, namely 780 - 830° C (1436 - 1526° F). The coating thicknesses with organic powder for decorative purposes are approximately 30 - 80 mµ and for functional purposes 200 - 500 mµ. Enamel powder can be used in a coating thickness range between 80 - 200 mµ.