new toy, clean calipers

[jholder]

Bought a new toy (powder coat gun, woo-wooh) this past weekend. Swung by the base to clean up my front calipers, before I coated them. Forgot to take shots of the calipers "before", but I'm sure you've all seen them. Half rusty, half bright red from the previous owners attempts at caliper paint. (a side note, if you're going to paint your calipers, at least take the damn things off and do a thorough job.

Damn camera phone, I'm going to have to get out the real camera for the "after" pics.

[jholder]

still not a good camera but...

[masagsxr]

Thats already after pix? I imagined it to be more glossy/shiney

[jholder]

It's a wrinkle finish, think OEM honda valve cover. I'll be doing the intake pieces in a gloss finish, but I wanted the calipers to be have a matte look. And something about wrinkle just makes me happy

You can coat and cure a piece in less than an hour, then slap it back on the car, which is certainly nicer than having to wait several hours like you would with normal paint.

[ElectricEnergy]

What is involved in setting up a small powder coating booth? You need the gun and materials obviously. Don't you need to electrically charge the part somehow? I see a stove burner in that picture. Do you use that for the curing process?

I'd love to have even a budget setup in my garage. It would make all your work look so much better.

[jholder]

Originally Posted by ElectricEnergy

What is involved in setting up a small powder coating booth? You need the gun and materials obviously. Don't you need to electrically charge the part somehow? I see a stove burner in that picture. Do you use that for the curing process?

I'd love to have even a budget setup in my garage. It would make all your work look so much better.

The basic setup would be:

gun
powder
oven
air compressor

Basically, the compressed air forces the powder down a tube past a positively charged wire, and you negatively charge the part via a clip from the gun's power unit. You need an oven of some sort (I picked up a cheap used oven from craigslist). Once you coat the part (with this powder at least) you heat the oven to 450, and set the part in there for about 5 minutes (long enough for it to melt/liquefy). then let it cure for about 20 minutes at 400*

My entire outlay, for used oven and kit was about $250. for comparison, my paint gun set up cost slightly less.

This is certainly a budget system, for the home hobbyist. I think it will be good to get the practice in, and see if it would be worth it to buy a more expensive gun in the long run.

Of course, the oven has to be dedicated for powder, once you cure powder, you can't ever cook food in that oven again.

[jholder]

decent camera. these are after I installed the new rubber and reinserted the piistons

[jholder]

hey masagsxr,
The blue wrench in there was my first attempt, that has a "normal" gloss level for PC. I assume thats the shinyness you were looking for

[masagsxr]

Yup.. thats the one.. So, if you want it matte look, does that mean you dont have to bake it in the oven and just let the powder coat dry? I've always been fascinated on how this works but not fascinated enough to spend $$$ on it hehehee.

I do like the glossy look. It looks a lot cleaner.

Can you post pix of your equipments? Thanks!!!

[jholder]

more cleaning. Overall I like it, I had some issues when media blasting, where it look like particles were being embedded into the metal. I think that is where some of hte surface imperfections came from.

[SW20 Dorifto]

how much does the gun run?

and what does it use .. "powder"?

[jholder]

The gun I purchased is currently available on Eastwood's site for $89 I think.
When I say powder, I literally mean powder. It's a dry paint process that has to be baked in a dedicated oven to cure. If that's what your quoted "powder" was about.

Hopefully I should be finishing up the other few pieces I wanted to do today. woohoo

[SW20 Dorifto]

for $89, thats tempting.. i love powder coating, but i dont have anywhere to place an oven.. definately not giving up garage space for it!

[jholder]

Originally Posted by SW20 Dorifto

for $89, thats tempting.. i love powder coating, but i dont have anywhere to place an oven.. definately not giving up garage space for it!

Yeah, between my table saw, and this oven, I lose a fair amount of storage space. I'm hoping when I fill up the garage with tools I can talk thw wife into getting a house with deatached garage/workshop

[jholder]

*sigh* before I started all this I thought it was just the big pieces that are nasty, now, for every part I clean, it makes the other pieces look just as bad. (For example the mounting bracket bolts didn't use to stand out, not they stick out like a sore thumb.... At this rate I'll never be finished.