Taking steps into the future
In-house paint shop with crisis-proof power supply brings flexibility and customer growth
To avoid having to wait for coating service providers - and because hall space was becoming available - a metal construction company invested in its own modern and flexible powder coating facility. This paid off, as the quality achieved and short delivery times quickly led to an increase in external demand.
For logistical reasons, SP Oberflächentechnik GmbH, a metal construction company in Hamburg-Farmsen, was able to significantly reduce its stock levels. As a result, there was suddenly space available on the company premises. The metal construction company, which is also active in window and door construction, previously worked with external contract coaters to apply paint to the components. "That often simply took too long," reports master metalworker Marcel Meyer.
In order to simplify the processes and have fewer interfaces in project management, junior boss Jan Stütz and Marcel Meyer decided to bring the powder coating in-house. This allowed them to make good use of the space they had freed up and expand their vertical range of manufacture.
Both already had their own painting experience: The existing company already had a wet painting area, which was now also expanded and became an integral part of SP Oberflächentechnik GmbH. "We could very well imagine coating ourselves - for the metal construction company, but also for external clients," says Meyer. And so, in March 2022, they founded their own contract coating company.
Fast and sustainable installation
Initially, Meyer and Stütz looked for a system manufacturer in their area, but the right concept for their requirements was not found at first. A very high degree of flexibility was important to the two founders. Through a search engine query, they came across the Wimsheim-based painting system specialist Meeh. The company's sales engineer Dietmar Damm made his way to Hamburg and assessed the situation on site.
"He immediately understood what we wanted and had the right system concept in mind," reports Meyer. The modular concept enables a system design that can be tailored to individual requirements. The Jumbo Coat modules include a powder booth, washing booth, curing oven and conveyor technology and can be expanded as required to adapt flexibly to increasing requirements. The promised short planning and implementation phase also spoke in Meeh's favor.
The master metalworker gladly accepted the system manufacturer's offer to get a taste of painting for a few days and get to know the processes directly at Meeh's contract coating facility in Wimsheim. "I then signed the contract directly on site - after making minor changes to the floor plan and a few parameters," he reports. The contract was awarded to Meeh after its jumbo coating system concept also proved convincing in practice.
Assembly completed ahead of schedule
Assembly of the system in Hamburg-Farmsen began in May 2022 and took around two and a half months. It began with the oven, followed by the painting and washing booths. As is usual with plant manufacturer Meeh, Meyer put together an assembly team of his own people, who assembled all the components under the supervision of a Meeh fitter. The assembly was completed a week ahead of schedule, the managing director recalls. It was an advantage that not only the managing directors but also the employees at SP Oberflächentechnik were able to familiarize themselves thoroughly with the system before commissioning.
Flexibility without downsides
The system comprises the washing booth, powder coating booth and curing oven modules arranged in parallel. There are 17 "parking spaces" in front of the booths, where the components are suspended on crossbeams on special product carriers and prepared for coating. They can also cool down here after the oven cycle. The overhead conveyor is moved electrically in the transverse direction, while the traverse is moved manually in the longitudinal direction. A further 15 cross beams, i.e. T-beams with rollers, and the transverse track ensure that the suspended components can be easily moved through the system and into the respective booth.
The powder spray booth is equipped with vertical extraction and air supply via the booth ceiling. Excess powder is extracted through a cartridge filter, while the cleaned air is fed back into the hall via a safety filter. The application technology, an "Optiflex" model, comes from the Swiss manufacturer Gema.
Metallic substrates - aluminum, steel, stainless steel and all metals - are coated on the new system, which has now been running for two years without any faults. The components are pretreated mechanically in the blasting booth, which is located in a separate hall in front of the workshop. The components are then hung on the product carriers and first pass through the washing booth, where they are degreased automatically or manually. The aluminum components are also passivated here to prevent a corrosion-promoting oxide layer; sheet metal components are simply sanded before priming. Once the powder has been applied manually, the components are moved manually into the powder oven via the crossfeed. Meeh has designed the system so that the waste heat from the oven is fed directly into a heat storage tank, which feeds the building heating system, including underfloor heating, as well as the hot water supply for the entire Group site. The water treatment for rinsing the washed workpieces before passivation with demineralized water is carried out by a reverse osmosis system integrated into the washing system.
Crisis-proof power supply and customer growth
During assembly, which coincided with the beginning of the war in Ukraine, Stütz and Meyer wanted to be able to operate the oven with electricity in an emergency - especially as they were unable to sign a gas contract at the time, as Meyer recalls. They therefore decided to install a large power generator on the company premises.
Photovoltaics were also supposed to be installed on the company roof to support production. However, this is currently not possible because the municipal utilities would have to install an additional transformer station. Coating could start from August 2022. However, the first few months were very slow before orders went through the roof from January 2023.
Customers now include locksmiths and metalworkers, as well as many industrial customers and the food industry, for whom SP coats grinders, for example, but also paints add-on parts and entire production lines. The team also coats metal doors for schools, including assembly, loft walls and lamps for a well-known designer. Order processing currently takes around a week in the north-east of Hamburg. As a coating company, SP Oberflächentechnik offers a complete pick-up and delivery service, even within 24 hours. "We want to offer our customers maximum service and be the better partner. That's why we also take on assembly work, for example," explains the Managing Director. The variety of colors is large - the paint warehouse now holds around ten tons of material.
When it was founded in March 2022, the young company took on two employees for painting. It was particularly difficult to find staff at the beginning - this was also the reason for retrofitting an automatic washing machine in the wash booth so that pre-treatment is automated. Eleven employees now work in production, administration and logistics. Two-shift operation is set to start in 2025 if the increase in personnel is successful.
The still young company's largest order was the coating of all the gates of the Hamburg wholesale market - this is still in progress and will be completed gradually. But the coating of 50 large industrial machines also ensured a very high workload, "we could have worked for three weeks straight," says Meyer with satisfaction. The investment in in-house coating technology has already paid off in full, two years after the end of assembly.