Valspar, manufacturer of wood coatings for prefinished flooring, siding, moulding, kitchen cabinets, furniture, and other building products, has began supplying coatings to a new American OEM hardwood-flooring line in Only, Tennessee. The new line is designed to produce 10,000 square feet of hardwood flooring per hour and delivers the flexibility to switch out finish colors in less than 10 minutes.
"Our goal with American OEM was to evaluate and implement improvements that optimize production for maximum up-time, precision, and performance," said Jim Hazen, global technical director for Valspar Wood. "This operation is geared for high-volume and high-style production and quick color change-outs on a variety of substrates and finishes."
As a first step in that evaluation process, Valspar Wood's application engineers conducted line productivity surveys and mapped line configurations and equipment based on desired production processes. Part of that process includes analyses of line speed, temperatures, calibration, cure parameters, coatings formulas, and color integrity, among other elements required for optimum production.
The Valspar Wood team of application engineers, technicians, color formulators, and coatings chemists, reported findings and recommendations back to American OEM management to improve throughput, efficiencies and cost control. From this exercise a standard operating procedure was implemented.
"Although American OEM is a new company our manufacturing team has worked together for many years," said American OEM chief executive officer Don Finkell . "We've worked with Valspar for more than 25 years so naturally they are an important part of our operation."
The American OEM operation uses specialized color mixing equipment that, when combined with advanced knowledge and expertise, consistently replicates colors that are 99.9 percent accurate. Equally important, the color equipment promotes sustainability because it greatly reduces tint and chemical waste involved in color formulation and reproduction, in many cases eliminating waste completely.
Finkell continued, "Valspar came in, evaluated our lines and went to work," he said. "They surveyed the current line speeds and finish parameters and immediately began working with and training our employees. Valspar's support was instrumental in getting our operation up and running."
