When Denny Young was just starting high school at age 14, he was already racing ATVs around the tracks near his home in North Carolina and elsewhere and even rigged up his own powder coating system in his dad’s backyard to coat his equipment.
When Denny fabricated an iron mailbox for his senior year project and ended up powder coating and selling a slew of them to friends and neighbors, that was when Joe Young decided to step in and help his would-be entrepreneur.
“That is when I knew he was serious about this,” says Joe, who saw his son form DJ Ironworks and then DJ Powder Coating in the family garage.
Partnering with Procoaters
Young has been working with Ross and Kim Scott, who own Maui Powder Works in Hawaii that licenses the patina process and teaches it to other powder coaters.In 2011, Procoaters’ owner Derrick Swaim heard about the prowess of DJ’s powder coating expertise and offered him three years’ worth of work if he opened a bigger shop and brought on more employees. Since then, DJ Powder Coating has grown three times and now sits next door to Swaim’s Procoaters location in Kernersville, NC.
While Procoaters specializes in high-volume fabricated, machined, and cast parts for the furniture and metal fab industries, DJ Powder Coating takes on batch work with two ovens (22.5-foot by 8-foot by 8-foot, and a 15-foot by 8-foot by 8-foot), a media blast room, and pretreatment room.
“What I’ve learned is you do not take shortcuts,” Denny says. “Not in preparation, cleaning, or not in cure times.”
Offering Decorative Powder Coating
The shop has been taking on commercial and residential powder coating projects for several years, and a while back, partnered with Procoaters to form Carolina Sublimation to offer decorative powder coating using the Decoral System to coat aluminum and other materials to accurately resemble authentic wood grain, marble and stone finishes, floral patterns, animal prints, and even custom logo graphics.
The process begins with a pretreatment of chemical conversions that is applied to a raw aluminum surface, which creates thin layers of amorphous oxide with a coating. A transfer film with the selected metal decoration pattern printed on it using special high-temperature inks is applied over the products with a tight contact. The products are then loaded inside a sublimation machine which is under pressure and temperature to vaporize the inks which penetrate inside the paint layer previously applied.
But DJ Powder Coating is about to embark on offering a new process technique called Powder Effects that applies a distressed patina look while also offering the durability and corrosion resistance of powder coating.
Young has been working with Ross and Kim Scott, who own Maui Powder Works in Hawaii that licenses the process and teaches it to other powder coaters.
A Finish that is ‘Really Gorgeous’
DJ Powder Coating partnered with Procoaters on using a Decoral finish on dozens of sets of doors used at a local prison.“It definitely is a learned art of how to apply the powder to get the patina look,” Denny says. “I do have an artsy side to me, and it takes some practice. But the result is really gorgeous, and there’s not a lot of facilities around that can do it.”
The Youngs have been working on getting samples made and have marketed the patina process with emails to current and potential customers, especially those in the furniture-making area around North Carolina.
Joe Young, who is also a co-owner of the company, says they have signed on one customer who it seems will give them steady work over the next few months in applying the patina finish.
“It’s a start, but we think this will be something that we can add to our services on top of the powder coating and the Decoral system,” Joe says. “We are just getting started with this, and it took us a while to learn the process, but we are excited to offer it. It is a little bit outside of the box.”
Consistent Finishes Without Terminal Decay or Fading
Kim Scott says that high-end markets are seeking ready-made finishes that possess consistency without terminal decay or fading.
“Our method is a disruptive technology that will impact the current ways of manufacture,” she says. “The innovative applications can produce beautiful, realistic finishes that are in demand without losing their toughness and durability the industry has come to expect, such as with UV, chemical, and scratch resistance.”
The Powder Effects line includes brushed bronze, wood and rust effects, marbling, and more.
“The brushed bronze effect could exceed architectural expectations by mimicking this type of metal look so hard to achieve through painting and so expensive to produce in the manufacturing market,” Scott says.
Relying Too Much on Industry Standards
Ross Scott says they came up with the new finishes because the current culture around powder coating doesn’t lend itself easily to visual innovation. He says it relies too much upon industry standards like single or two-coat systems as common methods to produce metal coatings.
“Lately, the focus has been mainly on margin and equipment to move the industry rather than developing better skill-based methods,” Ross says. “The limited availability for customers seeking aged, distressed and patinated finishes are not from a lack of demand but rather ability.”
DJ Powder Coating customers say adding Powder Effects to its list of services along with Decoral and general industrial coatings is a value-added service.
Over the years, DJ Powder Coating has turned to Air Power for everything from their powder guns, cleaning equipment, spare parts to filters. It was through this partnership with Air Power that they purchased their new Global Finishing Cartridge Booth.
Starting with the initial conversation regarding their needs to support after the sale, Air Power helped DJ Powder Coating make this big decision more comfortable.
