Spraying Small Parts

Q. My company manufactures components and subsystem for military applications, some of which need to be painted or coated per MIL-PRF-22750, DOD-P-15328 and MIL-DTL-53022 specifications. The components vary in size, but nothing is larger than 6 × 6 × 2 inches. We are in the process of upgrading our painting facility. What would be the recommended spray gun equipment for applying these types of coatings to our products? K.O.

A. The size and shape of your products make them perfect candidates for electrostatic spraying. You could rack several parts fairly close together at a time and paint them efficiently, so I would recommend using an airless electrostatic spray gun. On the other hand, if your parts have inside corners, you may have to use air-assisted electrostatic spray guns to overcome the Faraday cage effect.

If you are contemplating building a new, conveyorized system, the parts can be painted using automatic or manual spray guns. Manual guns would suffice for batch processing. For information on electrostatic spray equipment suppliers, go to PFonline.com/suppliers and click on Painting, then Painting Equipment, electrostatic spray.