We here at The Powder Guy strive to put out the best quality work in the market. We have a proven process that we follow strictly. Every part we receive is handled with care no matter if it is a couple dollars or a couple thousand dollars. We first take the part and identify the material its made out of. The reason this is important is most of the parts we get have some sort of coating on them, and we start the process by soaking the parts in a chemical solution to remove the current coating. Some metals can react with this chemical and cause irreversible damage if proper care is not taken. After this chemical bath they get a good cleaning to remove any excess chemical before drying and are them taken to our sandblast room. In this room the parts are hung on a rotating hook and “blast media” is shot out of a nozzle at a set PSI. This process removes any leftover coating that the chemical may not have removed and also gives the part a fine surface texture to aide in the powder adhesion process. You may notice on our pricing that “chrome” finishes are extra. This is due to the hardness of the chrome surface. We will cover this in another section below. After the Blasting process the parts are almost ready for coating. The parts are blown off to remove any dust or contaminant left over from blasting. The they are put in our oven at 400-450 degrees. The time they are in there for depends on the part. This is called “outgassing” and it essentially bakes all the impurities and releases any trapped air in the casting preventing the powder coating from bubbling as it cures. After this process is done the part is then taken out of the oven and the coating may begin. At this stage if a primer is necessary its is added first and then put in the oven for either a partial cure or a full cure depending on type of primer. From there the part is taken out and let to cool so the color coat may be applied.

Custom/Multiple Color Process

The custom side of the industry is time consuming but the most fun. Everything is done the same way at the beginning up until the coating part. When doing multiple coats it is a lot of attention to detail. We start by shotting the first coat of color. The part goes into the oven for a partial cure. Once the partial cure is complete we remove and cool the part. Once cool to room temp we are ready for our second coat. There are many different styles we can do. There is a fade where we angle the spray pattern to only coat part of the wheel and fade from one color to the next. There is 2 tone or 3 tone or more also. In this case we would coat the part in our next color and use a mini vac and finger technique to remove powder from the areas we want to remain the color of the first coat applied. Once the desired effect is achieved we put back in the oven. If this is the last coat we would do a full cure according to the last coat applied instructions. If there is more coating to be done we would do another partial cure and continue until the last coating is done.

Whats up with Chrome?

Ok so Chrome was all the hype years and years ago and to some it still is. However with the wide variety of options with powder coat it is becoming a very popular alternative. The trouble with coating over chrome is that chrome in itself is a very hard durable and smooth finish. In order for powder coat to stick to a surface it needs an electrical charge and a textured surface to attach to. Much like traditional paint. The problem that arises with Chrome is it requires a special chemical solution and processes to remove the plating back down to bare metal. So the part must be manually textured by Sandblasting. However with the surface being as hard as it is it doesn’t always work as desired. It takes extra time and care. The nozzle must always be moving and not to close to the part. If the nozzle is stationary and blasting the same spot for to long the chrome will start to deform. When this happens there is no turning back. You either spend hours upon hours manually stripping all layers of the chrome off. or you find a company that will strip the chrome plating. With that being said it is possible to coat chrome plating but the process is much more time and labor intensive. Hence the additional fee for any chrome plated parts.