One of the most important aspects of any automotive restoration project is applying a new finish to the restored car. While you could do this in an open bay of your restoration facility, this plan meets with two major obstacles. First if you are running any kind of restoration business or auto body shop, painting cares in this manner is illegal and second you are not going to end up with the kind of finish your restoration project deserves. Paint booths not only comply with the legal needs, but provide you with the right placed to paint your car.
Paint booths are designed to provide you with a completely enclosed environment, within which you can paint a car. This environment will be dirt and dust free helping to ensure that your finish will be as perfect as possible with no chances of unsightly debris in the paint.
While keeping the dirt and dust on the outside while you are painting these booths are also designed to keep the paint, paint fumes and solvents from getting out and causing problems.
One of the biggest side effects of spray painting a car lies in the fumes that are created by the evaporating solvents. The solvents are added to the paint to thin it down so that it can be used in the spray gun. Without these solvents the paints used to finish automobiles are far too thick to spray, however the fumes from the solvents can be quite toxic and flammable. To prevent the fumes from escaping the paint booth a replace air flow system must be used.
In most cases paint booths use an air replacement system that pulls the air through the booth drawing the fumes and overspray out of the work area and into a filtration system. The air is fully cleaned as all solvents, paints and dust is removed. It is the circulated back through the heater where is brought up to the required temperature and allowed to flow back into the booth.
This fully enclosed system provides a continuous flow of filtered, dust free heated air into the booth.
As you will be working in a closed environment all paint booths have some form of lighting built into them. You should look for a booth that has light fixtures both in the ceiling, preferably all along the junction of the ceiling and walls and in the walls themselves. The object is to ensure that you will have a steady level of lighting to paint in with no risk of shadows no matter where you are standing.
If you would like to learn more about paint booths and the legal requirements as well as what you are going to need to provide for the best working environment, you need to contact SK Bowling. Starting out as a small one man business in 1983 SK Bowling has become a world class manufacturer of spray booths, mixing rooms and ventilation systems. All products are ETL listed meaning that the meet all federal, state and local building codes and conform to NFPA 33 standards.
