Episode #184-Keeping it Kleen series: The Value of Preventative Maintenance

Episode Notes: 

Ever wondered why your paint work isn’t as flawless as it could be? 

Tired of having to rub every job due to a poorly maintained booth?

Are you looking to gain consistency in producing cleaner paint jobs every time?

Well, this episode was made just for you!

Discover the secrets to a pristine finish as we uncover the core issues behind paint booth contamination. This episode promises to equip you with essential strategies to minimize rework in your paint department, cutting down costs and elevating the quality of your output. 

Through a comprehensive Preventative Maintenance program, learn how you can transform your booth into a near-clean room environment. We explore the often overlooked role of proper vehicle preparation and find out how maintaining spray booth hygiene and refining pre-paint practices can lead to more efficient operations, as well as much cleaner finishes.
 
 We’ll also reveal the importance of keeping your equipment in top-notch condition and why air compressors, filtering components, and airlines are crucial allies in your fight against contamination. Our discussion underscores the financial impact of rework and highlights the importance of utilizing a strong Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) for your paint department. 

You'll also learn why personal care products might be your hidden adversaries. Tune in to empower your paint department with the tools and knowledge to achieve high-quality, consistent results

Link to Part 1 of Series: Root Sources of Contamination

Link to Part 2 of Series: True costs of Contamination

Link to video: 10 Secrets to Clean Paint Jobs! - Refinish Media - https://tinyurl.com/4ffbzbp7

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   https://www.youtube.com/@RefinishMedia

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Chapters

• 0:00 Preventative Maintenance in Paint Department
• 12:11 Maintaining Cleanliness for Efficient Paint Finishes
• 17:13 Maximizing Paint Department Efficiency

Transcript

Rick: 0:00

And welcome back to my new series called Keeping it Clean, where I break down all the aspects of what really creates paint department rework, the main sources of dirt and contamination, how to minimize them and the real costs of rework from all perspectives. And, lastly, what a good preventative maintenance program has on reducing repaints and extending the life cycle of booth equipment. All captured in short, bite-sized episodes of booth equipment. All captured in short, bite-sized episodes. This week we reveal the key to reducing those painful costs of rework by minimizing the amount of contamination we allow into our paint booth environment and paint work. To begin with, by implementing not only an equipment preventative maintenance program but better spray booth hygiene and pre-paint practices, they'll guarantee cleaner outcomes. Now you've heard the old saying an ounce of prevention is better than a pound of cure, right? Well, this episode truly drives that message home.

Rick: 0:55

Welcome to the MindWrench Podcast with your host, rick Sellover, where minor adjustments produce major improvements in mindset, personal growth and success. This is the place to be every Monday, where we make small improvements and take positive actions in our business and personal lives that will make a major impact in our success, next-level growth and quality of life.

Rick: 1:24

Hey, what's up everybody? Welcome to the MindWrench Podcast. I'm your host, rick Silover. Thanks so much for stopping in. If you're a returning listener and haven't done so already, please take a minute and click the follow or subscribe button and then rate and review the show. When you rate and review the show, the algorithms for Apple, spotify, google Podcasts, iheartradio, amazon Music and all the other platforms will see that it's valuable and show it to more people that have never seen it before, and hopefully it can help them too. I would really really really appreciate your help, sharing this word with your friends and family as well, and if you're a brand new listener, welcome. I hope you find something of value here that helps you in your personal or professional life as well. Please make sure to click the subscribe or follow button so you never miss another episode. Welcome back to the MindWrench Podcast I'm so glad you're here with me today and welcome back to my new series called Keeping it Clean, where I break down all the aspects of what really creates paint department rework, what the main sources of dirt and contamination are, how to minimize or eliminate them, the real costs of rework from all perspectives and what a good preventative maintenance program has on reducing repaints and extending the life cycle of booth equipment, all captured in shorter, bite-sized episodes.

Rick: 2:38

Well, hopefully you've already checked out the first two episodes in this series Root Sources of Contamination and True Costs of Contamination where first I explained where all that junk in your beautiful paintwork really comes from and then, second, what those actual costs of a redo are. And if you missed either one of those, I would highly suggest you go back and listen to those episodes first before you start on this one. This episode will tie it all together. Now, if you did already check them out, welcome to the third episode of the series. This week we reveal the key to reducing those painful costs of rework by minimizing the amount of contamination we allow into our paint booth environment and paint work. To begin with, by implementing not only an equipment preventative maintenance program but better spray booth hygiene and pre-paint practices that will guarantee cleaner outcomes. Now, you've heard the old saying an ounce of prevention is better than a pound of cure, right? Well, this episode truly drives that message home.

Rick: 3:35

Now, as I explained in our first episode, there are three main sources of where the contamination originates from the vehicle, the booth and the paint tech. And after an extensive study I did on this subject preparing for this series. There were a few things that were a little surprising about the results and a few facts that I expected that were strongly reinforced by the study. As a source of dirt contamination, the vehicle played a smaller role than I would have thought, as low as only about 10% of the dirt issues recorded were attributed to the vehicle, but a much higher percentage of fisheye contamination. But these concerns can be almost completely prevented by power washing the vehicle before it even enters the production floor and then again with a complete wash after final prep work is completed before it enters a booth, followed by a proper wax and grease and waterborne wipe down process of all the surfaces to be painted. But any contamination seen beyond that can usually be directly attributed to poorly maintained air compressor, air filtering components and airlines things that fall into the preventative maintenance category. Occasionally and randomly some contaminated air from outside can enter the booth through the ceiling filters, like if you're next to a greasy burger or chicken joint that's got really close proximity to where your booth draws its air. That can cause a fisheye breakout that can last a few days. But, like I said, it is rare and not really something you can prevent.

Rick: 5:02

What we're going to talk about in this episode is something called preventative maintenance, and what it really looks like and why it's not only a necessity for today's collision centers, but it really does pay for itself in a very short period of time. Preventative maintenance by itself is exactly what it sounds like the maintaining of a piece of equipment that will prevent it from incurring unnecessary and usually costly repairs or malfunctioning or just or stop working completely. This is not a new concept. You've been practicing preventative maintenance on your personal things for years, I would imagine. Think about your vehicles, whether they're owned or leased. You have a maintenance schedule to get your oil changed every. You know x amount of miles or x amount of months, right, and they don't just change the oil and filter. A reputable business will check the fluid levels, the brake pad, wear the tire, wear the battery and all those other things that, if not checked, could cause much more expensive work down the road if not caught right.

Rick: 5:58

What about your furnace or your home heating systems? We don't hesitate at all on this yearly maintenance, do we no? Because we don't want our furnace to go out in the middle of winter, when we need it most. Nor do we want a cracked heat exchanger silently taking out our family during the night. This almost happened to me and my siblings many years ago when we were kids and it was very close. It's just not worth the risk to save a few bucks. Agreed, we schedule our annual physicals, health screenings for cholesterol or diabetes or cancer. We do prostate exams, we schedule dental cleanings and oral exams, as well as our annual eye exams. Aren't those all standard preventative maintenance programs to keep our bodies, our equipment, running year after year after year and give us early detection of bigger health problems on the horizon? Absolutely, if you're looking for a competitive edge for your business or a more effective jumpstart to your personal development in 2024, I'll make your first step super simple.

Rick: 7:00

It is a fact that an incredible number of the most successful business owners, nearly half of the Fortune 500 companies, top-earning professional athletes, entertainers and industry leaders like Microsoft's Bill Gates, former President Bill Clinton, richard Branson, amazon's Jeff Bezos and Salesforce's Mark Benioff all have one thing in common they all have at least one coach and some have several that they work with on a consistent basis, someone that helps, guide, mentor and support them, challenge them, help them set and achieve goals that move them forward and then hold them accountable to follow through, driving personal and professional growth. Working with a coach has many substantial benefits. Just for an example, 80% of coaching clients report improved self-esteem or self-confidence thanks to coaching, 99% of individuals and companies that hire a coach report being very satisfied and 96% would do it again If, deep down, you know it's time to make those improvements in your business, your personal life, that you've kicked down the road year after year. If you're tired of knowing there's a better version of you waiting to shine, but unsure of how to bring that version to light. If you're tired of wanting to enjoy a more successful business but not sure how to start. And if you don't want to go another 12 months without better results but you don't want to go it alone, then take the first step. It's super simple. Sometimes talking to the right person can make all the difference. Go to wwwrixelovercom contact and I'll set you up with a free consultation. Call with me to see if one-on-one coaching is right for you.

Rick: 8:32

Then why do so many collision shop owners hesitate when it comes to committing to a preventative maintenance program for their most expensive pieces of equipment in the shop? Just for reference, today's booth equipment can cost anywhere from $100,000 to $250,000 for a quality, proven piece of equipment not the stuff you'd order from the back pages of a magazine or a catalog. So it's always the largest investment a shop owner will make. Would it make sense to protect that investment with a preventative maintenance program? Listen, no disrespect, but would you spend a hundred grand on a really nice automobile like a Porsche or BMW or Mercedes and then just totally skip the maintenance through an authorized dealer and instead just occasionally get the oil changed at a $9.99 quick oil change place in a strip mall because it's more convenient and cheaper? No way in hell you would right.

Rick: 9:26

As I mentioned in my previous episodes in this series, I've personally worked with hundreds of shops over my career and you'd be amazed at the number of booths out there, even one or two year old booths, that go unprotected, uncared for and unmaintained, month after month after month, eroding the lifespan of the motor, the bearings, the electrical controls and the other main components of the booth, until one day something just stops working or malfunctions, and guess what? A 911 call goes to the servicing distributor. And when I've asked owners point blank why they don't have a preventive maintenance plan in place, they just say, well, it's too expensive. And you know, they just come in and disrupt my workflow every time they change the filters. It's just a pain in the ass. I've heard comments like you know. You know how those booth guys are they're just trying to get rich off me, right? Really, some of these owners do have the Porsche, bmw or Mercedes and guess what? They do have the scheduled maintenance done on their car and I'm pretty sure that car isn't generating income for them, right? You know, like the booth is, like I've said before and I even did a podcast episode on this a while back, and I'll tell anyone that asks the booth or the prep decks are realistically the cash register of the collision shop. Nearly every single vehicle needs to pass through the booth or the prep deck before you can cha-ching the cash register right. Nobody gets paid until the job is completed, which means successfully painted and delivered period. There aren't many professional businesses out there that can successfully function with a malfunctioning cash register. It's just that simple, and a collision shop is really no different, but it's just never thought of in the same way.

Rick: 11:09

With that in mind, how long do you think your business would still be profitable for the month if your cash register goes down One day, two days A week? Any idea what that costs you in lost production? Well, if you listened to my last podcast in this series, the True Costs of Contamination, you would know that every booth cycle is worth about $4,350 of missed RO opportunity. That's based on a national average RO value of $43.50. Now, depending on how many booth cycles per day you average, it's just simple math in there, right Two cycles a day, that's $8,700. Four cycles a day, that's $17,400 per day, and it goes on and on. Right Now, if you do know what your monthly gross profit and, more importantly, net profit is, it probably doesn't take too many days before you're in the hole for the month. But if you don't know those KPIs, you may be going backwards after day one.

Rick: 12:11

Right Now, the easiest way to avoid the situation completely and protect your investments, your essential equipment, you know, like your booth and your compressed air systems, is by implementing a solid preventative maintenance program from your local qualified booth distributor booth cycles. Think about that for a minute A whole year's worth of protection for what it would cost? Less than what it would cost if you lost two booth cycles of production. Now a good preventive maintenance program should include some things like a monthly or quarterly filter service with visible records for 6-H compliance, semi-annual or annual ceiling filter service, air makeup intake filters and mix room filter service, pit cleaning service, inspect and replace color correct booth lights, tighten and replace belts, exhaust fan cleaning, quarterly or annually, multi-point inspection of all internal systems and an annual deep cleaning service, including booth coating. And, lastly, full reporting of all maintenance activities and status updates. That's what a good program would consist of.

Rick: 13:25

Now, just to be clear, as I explained in my first episode of this series, root sources of contamination. The booth environment can be responsible for a good portion of the dirt and contamination that ends up in a paint finish probably a good 40% at least and a preventive maintenance program will drastically minimize that number. But the painter still has control or influence over 50% of these issues with contamination that cause redos. So best results to drive down that amount of rework financial loss as well as keeping the booth environment clean as possible, both inside and surrounding areas outside, is to make sure your paint techs are number one on board and part of the preventive maintenance program, and number two utilizing a good SOP guide to improve the current hygiene practices and then keep them on track with those improvements.

Rick: 14:14

Having a freshly cleaned and balanced booth with fresh filters will not produce a super clean finish if the painter is jumping in and out of the booth to do a little sanding on the next job between coats of base, or he has filthy, dusty parts racks in the booth with two years of overspray buildup on them, with parts laying on them that he's spraying, or he's wearing a crusty old spray suit that hangs out on a hook by his toolbox, or maybe wears his baseball cap that's full of sanding and bondo dust right. Maintaining the air compressor and air filtering systems downstream, the airlines and the hoses and the desiccant system are all part of a maintenance program too, but the contamination protection for your paint finishes can be negated by your paint techs not properly prepping the panels with both solvent wax and grease and waterborne cleaner, not taking proper care of their spray guns, which really need to be fully torn down and cleaned quite often, or something as simple as being sure not to use colognes, perfumes, hand lotions, deodorants and those kind of personal care products that may contain chemicals that create fish eyes. Look, the bottom line is this when a shop doesn't follow a good preventative maintenance program and the paint team doesn't follow excellent cleanliness practices inside and outside the booth, not only does the shop lose money on extra paint material usage, wasted energy resources and lost production, but the paint tech also loses about $625 in lost wages and production every time he has to redo an average RO, if we didn't even talk about the impact to the most important piece of this puzzle, the customer experience. From my humble perspective, it would be a wise investment of resources to couple a top-notch pre-paint hygiene routine alongside of a good preventative maintenance program for all your booths and prep decks.

Rick: 16:06

Feel free to contact me if you need any additional information on this. I'm always happy to help. Hey, real quick. There's one more thing I wanted to share with you. If you're looking for a really good video that shows you, from start to finish, how to get a car properly prepped, get your booth ready and successfully spray a job with very minimal dust, dirt or any paint surface issues. I'll invite you to check out this video done by Gary Sobrey, an instructor at Washtenaw Community College in Ypsilanti, michigan. Gary was the guy that gave me my shot at being a refinish instructor there for several semesters.

Rick: 16:43

Anyways, gary has started a podcast himself called Refinish Media and he's been posting some fantastic videos and some how-tos and done some interviews with some really good guests. So I want you to check out this video. It's about 28 minutes long, but it's really probably one of the most comprehensive guides to really getting a job from start to finish through the booth with fantastic results. So I'll put the link in the show notes. Go check it out.

Rick: 17:10

Well, that's a wrap on my three-part series Keeping it Clean.

Rick: 17:13

Hopefully, if you listened to all three episodes, you now have a solid, comprehensive understanding of where all that dirt and contamination comes from in your paint jobs, how to eliminate or at least minimize it at each root source, as well as what the actual cost of rework is, how it financially impacts not only the shop owner, but the paint tax as well. Capping it off today with explaining exactly what preventative maintenance is, why it's important to not only producing cleaner paintwork but extending your equipment's useful lifespan, coupled with improvements in your paint department's pre-paint process, can really turn your booth into more of a clean room that's capable of producing car after car after car for years to come without the money-wasting hassle of re-dos, for years to come, without the money-wasting hassle of re-dos. Well, that's all I had for you today. Thanks again for tuning in. I really appreciate your support and I hope you have a great week. I can always be reached at wwwrickselovercom, where you can find all my social media links podcast episodes, blog posts and much more. Outro Music.