Low Energy Repairs - Batch Priming

Over the past year, the refinish industry has felt the significant impact of rising energy prices. To combat this, our technical experts have been working to ensure that PPG is at the forefront of low energy repairs.

This is where PPG’s partnership comes into play with a reassessment of the entire repair process. Before the significant increase in energy prices, throughput was the focus of new technology development and bodyshop profitability. PPG have now reassessed their entire collision range of products to ensure that market leading energy saving application methods are provided whilst protecting throughput optimisation and bodyshop profitability.

As we move into winter, when the outside temperatures drop, we enter a phase where the Spray cycle of the Spraybooth actually costs more than the bake cycle. This has a big effect on the approach to energy saving. To make significant savings it is no longer simply a case of reducing bake schedules and temperatures, you also have to look at how to reduce spraying times too.

Let’s start with the priming process for new panels. The traditional (and most effective method of priming new panels) is to apply wet-on-wet primers to these panels. This cuts down on the prep times required and offers shops faster and more effective through-put.

However, a standard Wet-on-Wet primer needs to be sprayed and flashed off before the basecoat and clearcoat can be applied. This can easily add up to 15 minutes of spray-mode & flash-off mode time for every job that requires a wet-on-wet primer application to a new panel.

The Self Levelling Primer technology, which has been a key element for years in the PPG portfolio, offers the best way to cut out the expensive spraybooth “spray & flash-off mode” time. DP4000 Self Levelling Primer can be applied and air dried with the ability to topcoat the panel up to 5 days later without the need for any extra flatting or preparation. This makes it ideal to use as a batch primer. So how does that work?

Demonstration of the DP4000 application to new parts

With Self Levelling Primer, you can batch prime all the new panels needed for the next day’s work the night before. Simply plan the last slot in the spraybooth each evening to be a time to prime all the new panels for the next day.

Let’s assume you have new panels for up to 7 jobs for the next day. Pack these into the booth and apply the Self Levelling Primer to all the panels in one short spray session (approx. 10 minutes in total). Simply turn off the booth completely and leave the panels to dry overnight once the panels have been coated.

Then during the next day, simply place the already primed panels, next to the rest of the job, and spray only the topcoat. This saves that 15 mins of booth time on EVERY JOB. For 7 jobs that equates to 105 minutes of spray-mode & flash-off mode time saved. This offers massive energy saving potential and has the added bonus of freeing up booth time, thus increasing throughput.

The batch priming method could easily save close to £50 per day in raw energy costs and allows you to get even more booth slots per day. That means more jobs, more revenue and less energy. On top of that there is also less gun cleaning, mixing times etc., so all round it is a win-win.

With this first reassessment of the repair process, we can confidently say that PPG can offer the most effective processes to cut energy within the shop. Solutions that truly lead to “Low Energy Repairs”.