Behlen
Mfg. Co. (Columbus, NE) is a metal fabricator that serves a variety
of markets—livestock equipment, pre-engineered metal building
systems, hydraulic presses and grain storage, handling and drying
equipment. Behlen Country, formerly known as the livestock equipment
division, manufactures and finishes farm gates, corral panels,
horse stalls, dog kennels and a variety of other livestock handling
equipment. “It’s an industry leader providing product
to farm store retailers like Tractor Supply, Quality Farm and
Country plus all the farmer-owned cooperatives across the country.
Some products, such as the horse stalls and gates, go to Lowes
and Home Depot,” said Tony Raimondo, chairman and CEO of
Behlen.
Behlen Country
comprises three manufacturing and finishing facilities in Columbus,
NE; Baker City, OR; and Huntingdon, TN. Each of these regional
plants manufactures the complete line of Behlen Country products
but with a different product mix and some differences in product
design depending on the specific needs of the company’s customers
in that region. For example, in the Northeast, many of Behlen’s
customers are farming hobbyists, many of which have a small farm
with a horse stable. These individuals are looking for a product
with fancier designs and a more decorative finish. This is in
contrast with the company’s customers in the Midwest and
West, generally the more traditional farmer, who are more concerned
with form and function than design and appearance. Behlen has
also had great success with new products aimed at the growing
pet products market. For example, the new powder coat finish on
the wire mesh dog kennels has helped the company dramatically
exceed sales expectations.
However,
sometimes it is necessary for these plants to ship product out
of their region. Therefore, Behlen must be able to color match
every part between all three plants while maintaining a consistent,
high-quality finish. To make this process as simple as possible,
Behlen is using the same powder coating and same powder application
equipment in its three plants.
The
Beginning of Simplification
“In
Columbus, we started by flow coating everything with a solvent-based
paint. They did and still do some of the painting with a silicone-polyester
paint. From there, we took on all our gates and other products
and went into hand spraying. That didn’t give us the weatherability
and the quality that we needed for our Behlen Country products.
So we ventured into the high-solids world,” stated George
Werner, manufacturing engineer at Behlen.
For a number
of years, the high-solids coating provided Behlen the finish it
required. But, as market demands and environmental regulations
changed, the high-solids coating suffered from some of the same
issues that the air-dry paint did. “We switched to high-solids,
which was more durable. But, it still didn’t have the durability
we were looking for,” explained Bob Stachura, president—corporate
manufacturing at Behlen. “And, the cost factor was a problem
too. On gates, you’re blowing a lot of liquid through. Even
though the paint wraps, you still use a lot of liquid. The transfer
efficiency was really bad. We were hoping to get a 60% transfer
efficiency, but in reality it was probably 40-45%.”
With its
need for a more durable, cost efficient and environmentally friendly
coating, Behlen Country took this opportunity to simplify its
finishing processes. For Behlen Country, this meant using the
same powder coating and installing the same application equipment
in its two existing plants and its new plant in Huntingdon, TN,
all of which took approximately
16 months.
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The
configuration of Behlen’s spray booths allows it to
maximize uptime by minimizing the time required for color
changes. The closest booth is used for red and green powder
and can be rolled on and off line. The middle booth is a
batch booth and is used for blue powder, which is sprayed
to waste. The booth at the far end is used for gray powder
only since it is the predominant color used by Behlen.
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The
Powder
Behlen Country
is using Corvel® 3000 TGIC polyester powder coatings manufactured
by Morton Powder Coatings. It chose this chemistry because of
its excellent resistance to outdoor exposure. In addition, the
adhesion of the powder coating is superior to the adhesion of
the high-solids coating, providing Behlen’s customers an
excellent finish with outstanding physical properties.
While Behlen
knew that powder coating would provide the best durability and
reduce the company’s environmental impact, there was one
difficulty that had to be overcome before it could begin using
the powder coating. The company wanted one powder coating formulation
that could operate in each facility and meet the color and gloss
requirements the company needed.
Plus, one formulation would allow Behlen Country to purchase the
powder in larger amounts, reducing the powder’s cost per
pound. The difficulty was that Behlen had a different cure schedule
in each of its plants due to the different oven lengths—375F
for 7 min in Columbus, 375F for 11 min in Baker City and 360F
for 20 min in Huntingdon. To overcome this problem, Morton sent
one of its formulators to each of the plants to observe the ovens
and the curing schedules. The powder manufacturer then had no
problem formulating a fast-cure TGIC polyester powder coating
that would meet the demands of the different cure schedules in
each plant.
Switching
from high-solids to a powder coating provided Behlen Country with
a number of advantages. One of the more significant advantages
was the reduced environmental impact of the powder coating, especially
when Behlen was ready to build its new plant. According to Don
Green, director of environment and safety at Behlen, “In
the case of our Huntingdon, TN, facility we would have had to
apply for construction permits in the state of Tennessee and perhaps
waited for several months while review of that permit application
was in progress. We would have probably had to hold up completing
the plant while waiting for approval from the state of Tennessee
that it was okay to go forward with a solvent-based operation.
But, with the powder coating system, since there are no HAP or
VOC
emissions, there was no permit necessary.”
While the
powder coating saved Behlen some upfront costs, because permits
weren’t needed and allowed the company to get its plant up
and running faster, there were a number of other environmental
benefits to the powder coating as well. “With a solvent-based
paint operation not only do you have to deal with disposal costs
directly, but you have to buy replacement filters for your paint
booth. You have to buy replacement paper. You have to buy 55-gal
drums. You have all these things plus the man-hours involved in
handling the paper and handling the sludge. With powder though,
there are no cradle-to-grave responsibilities,” explained
Mr. Green. “There are a lot of advantages down the road that
we may not see for awhile but will eventually demonstrate cost
savings. The only waste generated is a small amount of spray-to-waste
powder, which is a non-hazardous waste and can be landfilled.”
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Any
point where two pieces of metal are welded together can
cause a significant Faraday cage problem. But, thanks to
the powder coating and application equipment, Behlen gets
complete coverage over the entire part.
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“We
probably had a 75% reduction in waste disposal costs. In Columbus
alone, that’s in the $150,000-$200,000 per year range. That
number includes some of those replacement material purchases I
mentioned earlier. With the Baker City and Huntingdon plants,
we’re talking probably another $50,000-$75,000 per year savings
at each facility by not using solvent-based painting operations.”
In addition
to cutting environmental costs, the use of powder coating has
reduced application costs as well. The reduction in application
costs is primarily because of the increased transfer efficiency
the powder coating provides. Behlen’s products, such as farm
gates or wire mesh dog kennels, tend to have large holes or openings.
When the company was spraying a high-solids coating, much of the
paint missed the part resulting in a low transfer efficiency—about
40-45%. While powder coatings also have a tendency to be sprayed
through the part, their overall transfer efficiency is much higher
because the powder that missed the part can be recycled and reused.
“Now we get a 95-98% transfer efficiency. This lowers our
costs since we are reusing material, which is one of the reasons
we wanted powder,” stated Mr. Stachura.
Another benefit
from the switch to powder coating has been increased durability
and enhanced appearance of Behlen’s products. Many of Behlen’s
customers have already commented on the superior performance and
look of the powder coating. “Behlen Country customers demand
quality, and the new powder coat system has substantially improved
the quality of the finish. Many customer compliments have already
been received about the superior quality and durability of the
new powder coat finish. Clearly, our new powder coat system has
substantially enhanced the value of our products to the customer,”
said Mr. Raimondo.
The
Application Equipment
Just like
the powder coating, the powder application equipment was critical
to Behlen’s success with its new finishing systems. The application
equipment was vital because of two challenges Behlen faced in
coating its parts: Faraday cage areas and film thickness control.
Every product
that Behlen produces has a number of weld areas. This is especially
true of those products that have wire mesh on them (every time
the wires cross there is a weld area). These weld areas are difficult
to coat because of the Faraday cage areas they create.
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Notice
how Behlen hangs three gates per rack, which Behlen has
found to be the optimum rack capacity. The gates are staggered
so that the entire surface area of each part can be "seen"
by the spray guns.
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Another challenge
for Behlen was controlling the powder coating thickness on the
parts. At first glance, the products that Behlen manufactures
seem rather easy to coat. But, because the products have many
tubular parts, film thickness control is extremely difficult.
A common result is for too much powder to be sprayed on the sides
of the part and not enough on the top or the bottom of the part.
To overcome
these challenges, Behlen turned to Nordson for its powder coating
expertise. After hours and hours of testing in the lab, the two
companies created a powder coating system that consisted of two
automatic booths and one manual booth for Behlen’s Huntingdon
plant.
The first
and third spray booths on the line are Excel 2000s® with 28
automatic spray guns and 2 manual guns. The first booth is fixed
online and is used for gray powder only because of the high volume
that is sprayed; the second booth is used for red and green powder
and can be rolled on and off line. Between these two booths is
a Versa Coat® batch booth that is used for blue powder, which
is sprayed to waste because of the low volume that is used. This
configuration allows Behlen to maximize the uptime of the line
by minimizing the time needed for color changes.
Another advantage
of this system for Behlen is the airflow management system in
the booths. The airflow management system allows Behlen to create
the proper powder cloud, which helps to ensure the proper film
thickness on all surfaces of the parts, increases transfer efficiency
and aids in the coating of Faraday cage areas.
A further
advantage of the Excel booths is that the automatic guns are placed
on in-and-out gun movers. This is important because Behlen hangs
three gates per rack. The gates are staggered so that the center
bar can be “seen” by the spray guns. However, the gate
in the center is farther away from the guns on either side of
the booth than the gates hung on the outside of the rack. Without
in-and-out gun movers, the gates on the outside would be coated
too heavily and the gate on the inside would be coated too lightly.
However, with the in-and-out gun movers, all the gates are coated
at the proper thickness. Behlen also had two spray guns installed
on the top and bottom of the first and third booth to ensure that
each part was powder coated at the proper film thickness.
By using
the same powder coating and the same application equipment in
all three plants, Behlen has greatly simplified its powder coating
process. The company has only one training process for each of
its plants. Also, when one plant learns something about the line
or if a problem is solved that information can be passed onto
the other plants. “What we learn in one plant, we can use
in the other two because we have the same powder supplier, the
same equipment supplier and the same chemical supplier,”
explained Mr. Stachura. And depending on the capacity required
in each plant, Behlen can send the spray booths from one plant
to another, which is something the company has already done. As
you can see, installing the same processes has made life at Behlen
much simpler and ensures that the company’s customers receive
the highest quality product possible.
