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Stadco paint shop investment offers automotive customers the latest coating technology

Stadco Ltd, the leading supplier of body-in-white services and facilities for the global automotive industry, has announced further investment at its unique paint shop facility in Coventry in order to meet the changing demands from its automotive customers.

The investment, designed to offer customers the latest coating technology, will see the paint facility switch to the next generation Powercron 6200 cationic epoxy electrocoat supplied by leading specialists PPG Industries. Critically, it means the paint shop will now be able to coat all components going through the facility with black paint, increasingly the colour of choice for OEM customers and component manufacturers.

The latest Powercron 6200 paint offers customers a host of other benefits too including broader film build capabilities, improved transfer efficiency and excellent chemical resistance. Importantly, Powercron 6200 has been formulated to meet the automotive industry's increasing demand for improved corrosion resistance without the need to use heavy metals such as lead, thereby reducing any negative impact on the environment.

Stadco's unique paint shop facility in Coventry is one of the largest in the UK outside of a major OEM and can process everything from individual components, large body panels to complete vehicle bodies. The 8m long, 80,000 litre cathodic electocoat paint tank can process components and body shells over 6.1m in length, 2.5m wide and 1.9m in height and is one of the only independent paint operations outside of an OEM big enough to accommodate such large components.

This capability recently saw Stadco win a contract with Marshall Specialist Vehicles. Stadco won the contract thanks to its ability to process and apply paint to the large vehicle cargo bed Marshall SV is supplying for the new MAN Logistics Support Vehicle for the Ministry of Defence. In addition, Powercron 6200's improved corrosion resistance properties is particularly suited to heavy duty truck applications.

The Stadco paint facility can also process components in any steel substrate or aluminium in order to accommodate the increasing use of multi-materials in the manufacturer of vehicles. A number of other leading international OEM customers benefit from the capabilities of the Coventry paint operation.

Commenting on the further investment in the Paint Shop operation, Mr Dinos Andreou Commercial Operations Manager UK, Stadco Ltd, said: "Although Stadco is better known for its supply of pressings, sub-assemblies and product engineering to the global automotive industry, we continue to invest in our paint shop operations in order to complement this offering and provide our customers with a complete one-stop shop for all Body-in-White assembly requirements. The switch to Powercron 6200 is another example of this investment and underlines our commitment to meet the needs of our automotive customers and provide the latest paint coating technologies."