Powder Coating: The WD40 Method (TIS263)

well good afternoon and welcome to the idahoan show today i have a component that i want to powder coat but it's too big for the shake n bake method and i still don't have an electrostatic powder spray gun so i'm going to use the wd-40 method and while i'm at it i figured i might as well demonstrate the process for the benefit of anyone else who might be interested now the item that i want to powder coat is a fairly complex shape and it's made out of aluminum some of you may recognize what this is but its function is really not relevant for the purpose of this video this process should work about equally well on just about any component that is made out of aluminum or steel of course the first step is to clean the item that we want to coat so i'm going to do that by putting it in a bucket of simple green degreasing solution and scrubbing it with an old toothbrush until i'm sure that i've removed any grease or loose dirt and debris from the surfaces that i intend to coat now the one part of this component that i don't want to coat is some internal threading so i'm going to stuff a wooden plug into the threaded hole the wooden plug serves a dual function because it will also give me something to hold on to so i can manipulate the part without touching the powder as i'm applying the coating next i put some wd-40 on a shop rag and wipe down the part until there is a thin film of wd-40 on all the surfaces that i want to powder coat then i'm ready to apply the powder in this case i'm using eastwood hot coat semi-gloss black powder and to apply it i simply put some powder in an old salt shaker or rather a previously emptied bottle of parsley flakes that has a shaker top on it i sprinkle the component generously with this powder and then tap it lightly to knock loose any excess leaving a uniform coat of powder adhering to the wd-40 film it looks like there were some areas that i missed with the wd-40 so i'm going to put some wd-40 on a cotton swab and go back over the areas where the powder isn't quite sticking then i just sprinkle some more powder on those areas and again knock loose any excess once the part looks like it is uniformly coated all over i place it in a toaster oven resting on a sheet of non-stick aluminum foil and bake it at 400 degrees fahrenheit for about half an hour now the part has been baked and had a chance to cool interestingly enough it looks like my wooden plug contracted significantly when heated but i guess that doesn't really matter at this point what does matter is that the powder coating is now fully cured the coat isn't perfect it looks like there were a couple spots that i missed after all and this method will probably never yield quite the aesthetic uniformity of a professional powder coating job using professional equipment however for those of us who don't have the professional equipment this coating is substantially more adherent and durable than what i could get with a can of spray paint i should probably also mention that the powder coating layer is on the order of a few thousandths of an inch thick which is just enough that i had to do a little bit of refitting for pins and holes and other tight tolerance mating surfaces when i reassembled this component with the other components that it interfaces with in this case the required refitting was minimal and very easy but depending on what you're coding this might or might not be an issue so it's something to be aware of anyway i hope you found this demonstration helpful or at least entertaining and until next time thank you for watching the idahoan show

Channel: TheIdahoanShow

Views: 396,016

Rating: 4.7737675 out of 5

Keywords: powder, powder coat, powder coating, Eastwood, hotcoat, aluminum, DIY, hack, Idaho, Idahoan Show, Improvise, Improvised

Id: p3f6WiPdAXg

Length: 4min 54sec (294 seconds)

Published: Sat Aug 01 2020