“Danger” is perhaps too strong a word, but anytime you’re dealing with heavy metal parts, there’s always a risk of bodily injury.
This risk is heightened a little bit every time you move the part – for instance, transporting it from the parking lot to the blasting booth, then to the pretreatment booth, then to the powder coating booth, then to the oven. Each transition has potential for crushed toes, strained backs, and broken bones.
At Kaser, we help mitigate that risk by hanging the part on large, wheeled racks. Putting the part on wheels not only makes it easier to move, but also allows us the access we need to pretreat and powder coat every side. While we occasionally get creative with wire and chains, the most secure, least invasive way to hang a part is always to put a hook through a hole.
I’ll say it again, because customers often overlook this: we really need holes in the part so that we can hang it securely.
For instance, we have a lot of railing in the shop right now that comes with one vertical post with horizontal tubes welded to it to make the railing. The vertical post is easy to hang from the holes in the footplate; the horizontal tubes, however, are just a solid length of round tube that stretches about 7 feet.
With no hole drilled in the end of tube to hang from, we have to be creative. We might be able to hang it by hooking at the open end of the tube. However, depending on the weight of the railing, we’re running the risk of it falling off the hook, swinging and injuring someone, or bending on itself because the tubes are in a cantilever state (fixed to the post on one end and unsupported on the other end).
Ideally, we’d have multiple holes available to us for hanging, ensuring more security and better weight distribution.
While wire and chain can be helpful in these instances, I like to remind customers that anything rubbing up against the part will interfere with the powder coating application, and will result in us needing to do touch-ups with liquid paint after the curing process. This can be trickier than it sounds, particularly if we have to match an unusual color.
Obviously, hanging dilemmas, liquid touch ups, and color matching all add time, manpower, risk, and cost to the overall project.
If you want to avoid the added cost, consider drilling strategically-placed hanging holes into your part before bringing it to us. Particularly with railing, there’s almost always a way to ensure that that hole will be invisible after installation. It’s a quick, easy fix that saves us time, saves you money, and will go unnoticed after the part is installed.
The size of the hole should depend upon the weight of the part. We can help you strategize based on the kind of hook we’ll need to use. And of course, if you want us to do the drilling, we can – with the caveat that as always, doing it yourself ensures proper hole placement and the most money saved.
With just a little bit of planning and a couple of well-placed holes, you could find yourself saving some money.
