Anselm's Aaron's Angle

A former student shares a top tip for woodworking professionals

 

Aaron Dornhecker was a student on our 2007/8 woodworking course. He very kindly emailed us this discovery and has given us permission to reproduce the email for Anselm’s Angle. Although we don’t do much spraying on our woodworking courses this is nonetheless a very handy and relevant tip, comparing the 3M™ PPS™ Paint Preparation System to the HVLP Spray Gun.

 

Back in August I attended a woodworking trade show in Atlanta and ran across a product that I thought was great. The product is the 3M™ PPS™ Paint Preparation System. One of the few problems I encountered on the woodworking course was with the HVLP sprayer and not being able to remove the paint pot correctly.

Well, the Paint Preparation System solves that problem plus several others:

 

1. There is an adapter that attaches directly to the gun which allows the paint pot to be removed via a quick disconnect.

2. The new paint pot is clear which allows you to see how much product remains in the gun, taking the guess work out of spraying.

3. Another great part is cleanup. The clear pot remains clean and you only need a little thinner to clean the gun. If you didn't use all the paint you can cap the small paint ;bag and have it available next time.

4. The part that I liked the most was that the pickup tube is now gone. The paint is put into a bag that fits into the paint pot. The small plastic tube that pressurized the old pot now runs to the bottom of the new pot. Air is added into the bottom of the pot and keeps constant pressure on the bag inside. As you use the product the bag moves up to keep product always available for spraying. Now you can turn the gun to any angle without loosing the ability to spray product. To me there is nothing more frustrating than tipping the gun on its side to get into a spot and not having enough paint in the gun for the pickup tube. You wind up just spraying air. This design prevents all that.

 

This is a product 3M has marketed to automotive body shops for a number of years now and there is a complete list of 3M dealers on their website.

 

Take care
 
Aaron

 

If anyone else out there has anything they would like to share, please don’t hesitate to get in touch.