Material efficiency question for guns

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PostPosted: Thu Nov 04, 2021 4:48 pm
Probably a dumb question but I’m not finding anything through “search”. Trying to keep it short and sweet. I just feel like the gun is “wasting” material

I have a Tekna Copper with 7e7 cap and both a 1.3 and 1.4 needle combo. I also have a finex fx3000 with a 1.3 and 1.8. As of now I’ve been using the tekna for base and clear but it seems like every time I use it I blow through material much faster than I do with the 1.3 equipped fx3000. It doesn’t matter if I use the 1.3 or the 1.4 in the tekna it just seems to use more material and cause more of an overspray cloud.

Question 1: Are some guns just more efficient with material? I feel like this is probably a dumb question because you can always adjust the fluid knob but where I set it I’m getting great results with clear

Question 2: in an attempt to be more material efficient could I buy a smaller needled gun just for base? Or should I just really dial it down for base?

I have a feeling I just need to fine tune my settings and I’m over thinking this

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PostPosted: Thu Nov 04, 2021 9:04 pm
Tekna Copper with 7E7 cap is a High Efficiency gun that can put more paint on the panel, with less overspray, than an HVLP gun.

However, to achieve maximum efficiency you need to reduce air pressure to, IIRC, about 20psi. At those pressures you'll get great transfer efficiency but lots of peel.

So, you need to make a decision: peel or efficiency. For me, because I'm doing this for customers, the answer is efficiency because I don't want the car in the shop any longer than it has to be. But your situation may be different and the time it takes to flatsand isn't a factor, although, at the end of the day, you're still only going to end up with 65% of what came out of the gun on the panel given that the losses in overspray and sanding are probably going to be similar.
Chris



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PostPosted: Fri Nov 05, 2021 1:40 pm
I’m definitely spraying it at a higher pressure than 20. 30ish psi is where I get good result that require no cut and buff. What you say makes sense because in an effort to reduce overspray I shot clear at 22ish psi a while back and it was pretty peely.

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PostPosted: Sun Nov 07, 2021 4:49 pm
what clear are you using ? I use a 1.2 SATA RP for clear, @ 30/32 psi

when i know im going to cut it for a reclear i will use a 1.3 and cut my psi down to 24ish to achieve a thicker coating,

do you release the trigger when leading off the edge of a panel ?
are you using appropriate reducer so youre not wasting paint by trying to make it wet ?

lets hear your technique, not always the gun causing poor TE
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