Prep work before painting, powder or chroming is as important, if not more important, and certainly more work, than the actual chroming, painting or powder.

We powder coat thousands of parts each week.

Here are the steps we take Before powder coating:

1. Debur and round any sharp edges. ***



Powder will not be as thick on a sharp edge. To get good coverage, all it takes it to hit each sharp edge/corner briefly to give it a bit of roundness so the powder will be even and you don't end up with sharp edges where the powder will wear off quickly.

2. We run all parts in a vibratory tumbler.



Three things happen in the tumbler-

- Rough edges and small irregularities are smoothed out a bit
- The surface of the metal is cleaned of debris, dirt, grease, etc.
- The liquid in the tumbler not only cleans, but it leaves a coating of rust inhibitor on the metal.

Most powder coating shops will flash clean the parts right before applying the powder, this flash cleaning will clean off the rust inhibitor before the powder. But you don't want the parts to rust between when the prep work is done and the actual powder coating begins.

Click HERE to see a 5 second video of the tumbler in action.

Pic of some parts pulled out of the tumbler-




You can see the dry powdery inhibitor coating the parts ready for powder




***While powder will cover up very small irregularities in the metal, the likelihood is that the paint will not, and Chroming will accentuate any irregularities. With chrome prep, the surface must be perfect. Even the slightest irregularity will be magnified by the chrome.

 

But seriously...we call it a "Tumble Deburrer" for Tumble Deburring

 

Always nice to see how the process is done - thanks

 

I didn't realize you done all of that in house. We just call it "Roto"

 

Yep. We cut, bend, weld, drill, tap, grind, polish, tumble, wire connectors, and a ton of other stuff, right here in Red Banks, MS.

We have a local shop do our Powder Coating for us. We have a shop a few States over do chroming for us.

 

Hmm, "Roto"...for Rotate or Rotation? (Tumble Deburr)

or Rotary (using the die grinder)
.
.
.

 

Sounds a bit like 'hoover', perhaps a nickname for an old rotary tumbler machine?