Relicomp invests in a new automated paint booth

Jul 19, 2017

Relicomp invests in a new automated paint booth

The investment will improve customer service and quality

During the summer shutdown, a new automated paint booth will be erected into Relicomp’s powder coating plant in Kurikka. Thanks to the new booth, both the plant’s efficiency and quality will improve, and Relicomp will be able to meet the customer needs more flexibly, enabling cost-efficiency also for smaller painted series.

Thanks to the new automated paint booth, the efficiency of the plant can be improved; the turnaround time of the painted pieces will decrease, as will the time between colour changes.  The new paint booth will also be better for painting deep and multilevel shapes, which cuts down the need for post-process painting. The automated booth will trace the form of the painted piece, and the paint will adhere better, making the paint surface more even that before.

“The new automated paint booth is, first and foremost, an investment made with our customers in mind. It is state-of-the-art technology in Finland. It helps us paint smaller batches flexibly and keeps us from being forced to only paint larger series. We can paint more complex shapes in higher quality and carry out the orders with a tighter schedule. The entire supply chain is in our own hands,” says Relicomp’s Director of Production Arto Pitkämö.

According to the plant supervisor Miika Latvala, the new investment is part of the plant’s development project.

“The investment will bring financial advantages also in the short term as, thanks to the automated paint booth, we will be able to recover a larger share of the waste paint for reuse. The current 40% paint loss can be cut down to only 10%, thanks to the new booth.”

The automated booth is also almost fully self-cleaning, and the workers no longer have to do the cleaning manually. In addition to bringing financial advantages through smaller paint wastage and quicker operation, the investment will also have a positive impact on the environment, occupational safety and ergonomics, according to Latvala.