Collision Repair Training with Virtual Reality

VR simulations aren’t just for common practices such as painting a panel. VRSim’s refinish simulator is highly customizable, so shops can set up very specific scenarios to match exact manufacturer specs or a rare part that might not be commonly found in a shop to practice on. 

“On new, unfamiliar, or especially difficult parts, it’s an invaluable tool,” said VRSim CEO and President Matthew Wallace. “Take a door with a strange crevice where you have to layer the paint and angle it with a specific technique. You’ll learn it eventually, but it’s far better to practice on a simulator - where you can do it wrong, see what didn’t work, and try again. It gives people a safe, experimental space.”

While simulations can help teach a specific standard and technique for refinishing or welding, the metrics it measures can be customized to accommodate experienced professionals who have developed their own style. 

“You can set all of it. There are sliders for quality vs. speed - 50/50 coverage, heavier coverage - every bit of it is customizable,” Wallace said, offering the example of another painter who prefers a 75% overlap technique. “His base simulator scores were terrible because he paints fast and thin, but he does multiple coats. He’s a great painter. Once we adjusted the simulator to account for thinner coats, more passes, and a higher rate of speed, he scored just fine.”

Nair said they’ve commonly found that painters who didn’t have a formal education tend to reach the same quality of finish by compensating. For example, someone spraying from too far away also sprays slower to maintain the same film thickness. Based on calculations to determine the most efficient painting method, it could result in the same quality but use more paint. 

“They may get the right finish, but they may have taken up to 50% more paint to get the same job done because a lot more would have gone to waste into the air or in getting oversprayed,” Nair said. “Our belief is, when it comes to training fresh learners, teach them to not just paint, but to paint in the most efficient way possible.”

VR technology can help upcoming students and future technicians learn the trade, and experienced technicians keep their skills sharp and learn new techniques. Skillveri does the bulk of its business currently with colleges and collision repair programs. Nair said their membership with SCRS helps them connect with shops and currently work with almost 100 schools. 

“All of them talk to us with some thoughts that they would have,” he said. “So, we keep making a list of these things we keep hearing from the market.” 

VRSim has seen its business move from 75% education eight years ago to 60% industry businesses, 40% education today as the company has expanded its applications across automotive, aerospace, and industrial industries.

The ROI of VR simulations isn’t limited to just cost savings on materials. Wallace said the most important factor is the time VR training can save. Shops can train on site without having to travel to another location or mail one VR set between multiple shops while getting more practice reps in. 

“The real savings is time. Billy Huneycutt, a teacher in North Carolina, had students who went on to compete in Skills autobody painting competitions - and they placed well,” Wallace said. “Why? In part because they had essentially practiced hundreds of repetitions instead of (maybe) 50. They didn’t have to sandblast and repaint every time because they were practicing in simulation: click a button, get a new part. The number of repetitions is dramatically higher.”

The technology doesn’t stop at refinishing or welding. Nair sees many possibilities to apply VR training from the beginning to the end of the repair process with the dream of being able to, one day, be able to have a user be able to start a virtual repair with blueprinting and diagnostics and go through a complete, simulated repair. 

“Anything that you teach with VR, you don't spend actual materials, or you don't risk getting hurt or damaging actual equipment,” Nair said. “So anywhere where there are safety concerns or difficult to replicate scenarios, training could be done efficiently and very cost-effectively using virtual reality.”

Later this year, Wallace said, VRSim hopes to release an update for spot and edge blending, which can be difficult to teach and wants to work to create a simulation for structural repair in the future. 

“I like the repair side things like frame straightening and structural repair work,” he said. “That’s very much on my mind in terms of going to that next level there and offering more of an integrated curriculum.”