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Ideas on direct-to-metal paint for stacking chairs

We are doing volunteer work in the Dominican Republic and are getting ready to do a production run of thousands of stackable chairs made out of 18 gauge, 1" square steel tubing. Our bending, welding and even upholstery techniques are coming along. but we have not come up with a practical production painting system.

Our painting facilities are very small and our current equipment crude. We have a Wagner 2900 HVLP system and also a 2900 conversion gun for high air pressure. We do have a large compressor. We also have a older HERO airless.

We are looking for a finish paint that can be painted direct to metal so we avoid the handling logistics of moving thousands of chairs into and out of our small paint shop as well as the logistics of allowing them to dry between coats.

We've looked at powder coating but the costs and complexities of setting up are rather intimidating. We also tested dipping the chairs for the primer because it could be a separate "out of paint shop" step (we have lots of volunteers) but the results were not good. (Runs, poor paint adhesion, etc)

Any advice/sources on direct-to-metal paint or any other ideas would be much appreciated.

Steve Toburen
fabrication shop - Santiago, Cibao, Dominican Republic
2005

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Check Sherwin-Williams for primerless topcoats.

Sheldon Taylor
supply chain electronics
Wake Forest, North Carolina
2005