Prepping to PERFECTION

Getting a vehicle ready for painting is a critical procedure in a body shop, and technicians need to know what the recommended procedures are — and follow them.

Mike Shilling, a 200-percent production painter, says, "When I hear a buffer whirring I'm not making money!" Prepping is one of the most under-appreciated tasks in a body shop; it's also the task most often assigned to the new person."

How does one proceed to prep to perfection? Surprisingly, there are many sources for prepping procedures. Most paint systems offer their recommendations. Some booth manufacturers also supply procedures for preparing for a clean paint job. In addition, masking material producers provide directions and "Tech Tips" for the use of their products when prepping.

In spite of all of these sources available, not all painters follow the recommended procedures. In fact, many painters use "shortcuts" to speed up the painting process, and though these techniques may work well from time to time, they may not be consistent under all conditions and quality can suffer as the painting conditions change.

Paint and equipment manufacturers put considerable time and trial into their recommended procedures to assure that they are both the most consistent and most conducive to a long-lasting repair. Painting flexible bumper fascia is a good example. Though many painters can and do produce good-looking paint jobs when these jobs leave the shop, the fascia are likely to peel later if the recommendations were not followed, thus producing a vehicle that will need repairs later. "Re-do's" not only cost the shop because of the time and materials that they consume; they also displace other profitable work that must wait to be done while technicians work on the corrections instead.

So how does a paint department produce consistently "prepped for perfection" work? Production managers or lead painters could look to manufacturing for the answer. The manufacturing industry has realized the need for and devoted a great deal of study to development of production standards to assure consistent quality and efficiency. Only in the last few years has the collision industry similarly realized the need for the development of a business production standard, or standard operation procedure (SOP), for each department, whether it is the paint department or the front desk. Even something as basic as an SOP for greeting customers and making their initial or repeat experience with the business positive, will go a long way toward assuring that they will become customers for life.

With all of the varying recommendations for production procedures, how does a business go about producing SOPs for the company? First, (and some would argue that it is the most important) SOPs should be in written form, for all employees to know and be able to reference. It is important that structural and non-structural repair technicians know how the paint department will be proceeding with their initial repairs. Knowing how the paint department will proceed, they will know when it is critical to keep a repair as small as possible. Once a SOP has been written, it should be available for employees to reference as needed.

For the paint department, paint system manufacturers supply production sheets or "working process" recommendations. These are detailed, systematic procedures that must be followed to maintain the paint manufacturer's warranty. Some paint system manufacturers require that the painter be trained to use their system before the warranty will be valid. Many collision shops believe that just using these production recommendations would be sufficient for their shop. However, for the most productive and consistent shops, a more detailed production procedure is necessary.

As an example, one of the most often forgotten steps when prepping to refinish a repair is to soap and water wash the vehicle. Even though the vehicle is cleaned prior to its being repaired, the process of repairing often contaminates the surface to be refinished. Though some vehicles that come to the paint department may not be contaminated, often they are, and therefore one of the first steps should always be to wash the vehicle. A vehicle should also be detrimmed prior to soap and water washing so that any dirt that might be hidden by trim can be cleaned. The company's policy as to how much trim should be removed should also be stated in the SOP, since this is a subject that a manufacturer's production recommendation often does not address.

Another policy to standardize is which wax and grease remover should be used. Many shops use an initial more-aggressive wax and grease remover before the work is started, and a less-aggressive final clean before paint is applied. Also, in some areas of the country, shops are restricted as to which kind of wax and grease remover they can use.

SOPs should include items such as:

Which type of corrosion protection that should be used;
The type of blocking, wet or dry and the use of guide coat;
What grit sandpaper and its progression;
When to use infrared lights.

In addition, SOPs should be determined for re-washing and compressed air drying, masking procedures and materials, booth cleaning and balancing, types of blending used for specific conditions, and procedures for painting parts off-vehicle.

Sometimes a repair will come to the paint shop and appear to be a straightforward refinish. The paint team might start to prepare the vehicle without looking at the work order, thus missing something that needs to be refinished and extending the vehicle's cycle time. To avoid confusion, vehicles should be "staged," that is, the writer of the estimate should go over the repair with the lead painter so he or she will understand exactly what was communicated to the customer. A few minutes up front will go a long way toward reducing time-consuming delays later in the repair.

Specific paint shop SOPs can be developed by first looking at the recommendations of the paint system used by the shop, at material manufacturers' recommendations, and at the recommendations of the manufacturer of the equipment the shop uses.

Once the decision has been made about which procedure is best for a shop to follow, an additional benefit is that a materials list can be developed. With each employee using the same grit sandpaper, tape size and cleaning products, the shop will be able to control material usage and expense. The shop personnel can do cost studies to determine which material is most cost-effective for the shop, answering questions such as: "Is it more cost effective to use 1½-inch tape or 2-inch tape?" "Is it necessary to have both P220 and P240 grit paper?" "How close to the edge of a panel should the blend stop before it is necessary to blend into the adjacent panel?"

With written SOPs, teams will be more consistent and productive, variables can be controlled better and the majority of the decisions needed for each repair will be answered before the work is started. Because there are so many variables in painting that can't be controlled (humidity, temperature, etc.), it is absolutely necessary that all of the controllable variables are anticipated and controlled.

In both manufacturing and in collision shops that have taken the time to develop and use them, SOPs have proven to be a very productive tool.