10 Reasons Why a Paint Booth Service Technician Should Inspect Your Booth Every Year
With the New Year less than two months away, it’s time to start thinking of your paint booth’s annual inspection. Yearly inspections make sure that everything is functioning properly, noting any items that show wear or potential problems. While most routine maintenance can be done in-house, it’s best to let a professional paint booth service technician perform your annual inspection.
Accudraft’s Trained Service Technicians
Accudraft has a training facility in Randolph, NJ to host company-wide training for new hires as well as long-time service crew members. We teach our techs how to stay on top of documentation, diagnostics, and end-user training, along with covering all the miscellaneous things that can happen when servicing booths. We strive to ensure that if you have someone from the Accudraft team show up, you’re getting the best service in the industry.
Benefits of Annual Inspections
Here are the top ten reasons we recommend an annual inspection for your paint booth.
- Replace Worn Parts: Over time and use, it’s inevitable that a booth’s parts will become worn. They won’t perform as well as they once did, potentially slowing down production phases. An inspection will identify all parts that need to be replaced, including but not limited to motors, fans, lights, bearings, and filters.
- Prevent Costly Problems: Owning a paint booth is an investment and should be taken care of like one. After spending tens of thousands on a new booth, the last thing any owner should want is to spend even more on a repair. Inspections are a great way to prevent costly problems by being proactive rather than reactive.
- Increase Booth Productivity: Inspections can increase a booth’s productivity by eliminating what’s holding it back. For example, correcting any hardware or electrical components that weren’t functioning properly will help to reduce downtime.
- Re-balance All Systems: VFDs and pressure settings can become unbalanced over time from slight adjustments and changes within phase cycles. It’s crucial to routinely get your booth re-balanced to ensure proper airflow and filtration.
- Replace Clogged Filters: Filter maintenance should be performed more than once a year, but it doesn’t hurt to get them checked out again during an annual inspection. Clogged filters can have a negative impact on airflow, not only by disrupting air patterns but by preventing the removal of airborne particles from the cabin.
- Upgrade Interior Lighting: The new standard for paint booths is LED bulbs since they are environmentally friendly, recyclable, and better for preventing metamerism. However, many shops have been using the same booth for years—even decades. During an inspection, we’d recommend upgrading any old lighting fixtures to LED bulbs.
- Clean AMU Fans and Motors: During an inspection, the technician will look at the booth’s AMU fans and motors, ensuring they are clean and all in one piece. Too often, shops let over-spray build and build on these parts, which slows down its performance. In extreme cases, we’ve even seen fan blades break off due to poor maintenance.
- Remove Any Over-spray: While we already mentioned AMU fans and motors above, there are more places over-spray will build up. The inspector will identify all of these key areas that should be cleaned, including the interior walls, light fixtures, and floors. They may also recommend a covering solution for the walls or floors to help easily remove over-spray in the future.
- Identity Potential Upgrades: One of the biggest parts of an annual inspection is identifying potential upgrades for a finishing system. Accudraft paint booths are designed to last, but poor maintenance can greatly diminish their life expectancy. That’s why it’s crucial to keep up with services and repairs, and continuously retrofit a booth throughout its lifetime.
- Avoid Long Downtime: Downtime can be one of the worst problems a collision shop can have. It means servicing less customers per day and losing money. With an annual inspection—and some routine maintenance throughout the year—shops are setting themselves up to experience the least amount of downtime possible.
What Happens After a Booth Inspection?
After a trained Accudraft inspector evaluates a shop’s paint booth, they will put together a detailed report outlining the status and quality of everything that was inspected, as well as any recommendations for replacements, repairs, or upgrades. Annual inspections are crucial to keeping your paint booth running at its highest performance for many years to come. Schedule yours today!