who has used a hobby style powder coating ?system.

I've got some small parts that will be exposed to the worst of road debris and weather. I have seen these home remedy type powder coating systems, (Eastwood). and thought they may be a solution to the problem of having parts chip and rust. Any thoughts? Who has done this and how was the results? Thanks

 

I have, and was very pleased with looks and durability. It is an Eastwood system, but I buy all brands of powdercoating material. Like paint, prep is very important.

 

yep what he said......i realy like mine. did some stuff for other guys and some were happy and some not what I've learned, its tough to gauge how thick you have the powder. to thin and it will rust through. to thick it can crack and peel, or burn in the oven. watch your temp in the oven!! these old throw away ovens seem to burn out the oven thermostat after a short time. you can buy a small dial oven thermometer for a few bucks. I drilled holes and put screws through the top of the oven with hangers all over. so i can hang it full of small parts

 

I have used Eastwood kit on lots of underhood stuff.

Great results and still looks great after 3 yrs.

I agree with the use of an oven thermometer. I don't trust the old oven I got for free.

 

I have a eastwood gun. Works really well, I ended up using the optional diffuser. I use a black and decker convection oven so I cant really do big things..

 

Do a search. There was a post on here not very long ago about using a toaster oven. I know I am going to give it a try.

 

i too use the cheapest eastwood powder coat system. i made all my accessory drive brackets and pc'd them. i also pc'd my 15x8 steel rims in my 30'' discarded oven 7 yrs & 10,000 miles ago, they still look good.

i used an infrared thermometer for a while until i figured out that the oven thermostat was as accurate as i needed. i tried to put parts in a hot oven and either knocked the powder off or burned myself. now i powder coat in a box above the oven, gently move the part into the oven, close door, turn on oven to temp, start the flow out timer when the oven-on-light goes off, reduce heat to bake and turn off the oven when bake time is done. i don't open the door until the next day. not the quickest way to do it but i'm not in a hurry either.

to powder coat the wheels; i made a rotisserie to turn the wheel on the rack while it was pulled out of the oven and gently slid the rack in. using this size oven for wheels requires that you do each side separately.

 

The wife is still pissed at me for washing parts in the dish washer..
I have not been brave enough to put parts in the oven...

 

I've got the Eastwood hot coat pro and it works great.
So far I've only used the eastwood powder and have coated hundreds of parts.
It takes a bit of experimenting to get things right.
There is a powdercoating forum on eastwoods site that was very helpful.
I built my own oven so I could do larger parts.
Everything has to do with the part temperature, so a good infra-red thermometer
is helpful.
As with everything preparation of the part properly is the key.

 

I owned a cheap system from Sears,notice I said owned, threw it in the trash after being frustrated.

 

I have the Sears system. Haven't used it yet but if it doesn't work, I'm out the $10 I spent on it at the swap meet. I'll just upgrade to the Eastwood system.

 

And I thought I was the only one! It was only a fan shroud, but my son thought it was funny ...so funny he told his Mom

 

I just bought a Eastwood System, my question is I have a old oven to use does it have much of an oder to where it should be vented or done out side?

Thanks Mark

 

Recommended not to do this in an oven you ever put food in again. I don't know why, that's the claim. I'm looking for an old oven now. I've used a toater oven for years to bake on rattle can paint, toughens it up alot

 

I have 2 HF systems and they work great (about 4 years now). Reason I have 2 is we often are coating 2 different colors all day long and I dont have to clean them between color changes on production runs. I have made a simple "box" that I can open the door ad put this 3 sided "box" on and it doubles the oven size allowing me to do things I cant i a standard house oven (like T firewalls and radius rods and springs).

 

all it cost me was a new oven for the house it also takes a while to get the smell out of the house

 

I have a HF unit for three years. Works great, powder from different sources. Summit colors are very good.

Bought an old wall oven from Habitat for Humanities for $25.00. Wired it up in a 6x12' shed and made various hangers. Works great.

 

I got a free household oven when my buddy modernized his old kitchen. Later he gave me a counter top toaster oven. I use them both. I love the toaster oven for small parts like carb linkage etc.





quick and easy. As soon as it cools it's ready to handle so no waiting for the paint to dry. It's amazing how much hotrod stuff fits in a toaster oven. No need to use the big oven. I keep the big oven in the garage and it plugs into the welder socket when needed. The toaster oven just sits on the oven. I never use the cook top for anything other than a shelf for toaster oven.

 

I've been using a HF unit for a couple years. Works great. I fabbed a spray booth in the corner of my shop. I bought an old electric oven off Craig's list. I buy my powder from Powder-by-the Pound for the good stuff and HF powder for the not so pretty stuff like the insides of valve covers and oil pans. I found out several techniques to improve the results including preheating the parts. It's alway a challenge to do both sides of a part at the same time. We get pretty creative hanging parts on the bottom side of the oven racks.

 

I started with a cheap eastwood gun and after doing a lot of coating I upgraded to a much better gun form columbiacoatings.com

Its all in the oven....otherwise everyone would be doing it. I was fortunate to get an industrial convection oven for $200 that can hold the temp to a few degrees of accuracy. Below is a photo of doing a mustang cross member in my oven. I powdercoat just about everything. I expanded the oven to be able to motorcycle frames. I keep busy doing lots of wheels, bicycles, snowmobile parts, etc....