Stripping electrophoretic CED coatings

A. The best way is to remove the paint with paint remover dipping method.

You dip the hook in the solution and after minutes or one or two hours , depend on the thickness of the paint, the paint is removed completely.

A. Diane:

You'd be surprised by the can of worms you have opened. The options are many and which one you pick depends largely on several criteria. Supplying those criteria in your message is more than likely to get a better response from the readers of finishing.com. I'll help get the ball rolling.

1. What size are the hooks?
2. What is the metallurgy of the hooks? (probably, mild steel; but need to know for sure...)
3. How many hooks need to be stripped per day, per month, etc.?
4. What kind of paint(s) need to be removed?
5. How thick is the paint on the hooks?
6. What kind of capital budget do you have for this project? (Several of the options are very costly)

If you don't have any money set aside for this project, have you looked into sending this work out to a job shop stripping house? There are several very reputable companies that do this for a living and charge a reasonable price. With that in mind, do you really know what it costs "you" to strip the parts in-house? Don't forget energy and waste costs... You'll need to know this to determine if any of the options will save you money.

Answers to the questions above will help determine which methods are feasible for your needs. For example, if you need 500 hooks per day stripped, chances are that plastic blasting media is not for you. Likewise, if you don't have about $250,000, a laser ablatement system is out of your price range.

There are a couple of options that are reasonably priced for hooks. One of them is burn-off. Other thermal methods that might work are: Molten salts, fluidized sand bed and cryogenic. Several chemical choices are out there as well. Depending on thickness of paint, I have seen paint hooks cleaned by banging them with a hammer. (labor intensive yes, but cheap...)

You have a long strange road to travel. I'll be glad to help if I can. Good Luck!

A. Best solution is using thermal cleaning. No need for nasty chemicals. The best thermal cleaning technology I know is Fluidbed Cleaning.

A. Good day.
I last worked in E coat 15 years ago. We "stripped" our racks overnight in an oven, to effectively "burn" off the deposit. Temperature is a factor, as annealing can occur.
Unless technology has improved, I would hazard a guess as to use a solvent, which would require waste treatment/disposal.
As the old adage suggests, build a better mouse trap, and the world will beat a path to your door!

A. What's the jig's base material, what's the coating and what does it mean ED? Why is HOT sulfuric not acceptable?

A. Hi KC. Burning it off in an oven is the only other way I've heard of. But, in general, most paint and organic coatings can be removed with methylene chloride without harming the metal, can't they?

Regards,

A. Hi Ashish. We appended your inquiry to an earlier thread suggesting that concentrated sulfuric acid, or methylene chloride may be generic chemical solutions to the problem -- but there are safer and sounder proprietary chemical methods.

Burning the coating off is another possibility.

Finally, blasting with a proper media may be the answer, but CED is often applied to reach areas which other methods can't reach, so it's hard to say whether it will remove all of the coating. Good luck.

Regards,

? Hi Dzul. Sorry, I don't know what ABS method means. But your question will surely draw far more interest is you summarize your experience with using the ABS and water jet methods rather than just asking a question without offering the readers anything to learn from the time they spend on it. Thanks!

Regards,