Which is the best for Powder Coating?
When trying to select a powder coating gun you can be put into a situation where you have to choose which type of powder gun that will work best for your application. In this article we will be discussing the Corona vs. Tribostatic powder coating guns and their major advantages/ disadvantages.
Corona Powder Gun
How it works:
Corona powder guns are the most used in the powder coating industry. These guns work by electrically charging the powder as it passes through the gun with a high intensity charge. You then have a ground lead attached to the piece you are coating which gives the piece a negative charge. The powder has a high charge coming out of the gun, which is attracted to the grounded piece making the powder adhere.
Disadvantages:
The corona powder coating gun really has only one major disadvantage which is the faraday cage effect. This usually occurs when you have a lot of deep contours or twists in your piece. These contours can mess with one another by sharing a electrostatic charge causing the powder not to adhere in these areas. Eastwood has helped with this problem by offering a Dual Voltage Gun. Therefore when in these areas you can lower the powder kilo-volts helping to not make this happen.
Advantages:
There are many advantages to using the corona powder coating gun. The most important is that you are able to use basically every type of powder in these guns, which makes it highly versatile. Another benefit to using this gun is that it has no components to wear out like the tribostatic gun. Which makes cleaning it a lot easier because all you have to do is simply blow the gun out, and you’re done.
Tribostatic Powder Gun
How it works:
The tribostatic gun is the lesser used gun in the powder coating industry. This is due to many different factors. The tribostatic gun works by having the powder pass through an insulated conductor at the tip of the gun where the powder gets a high intensity charge. This gun is similar to the corona because it also uses a ground lead that you attach to the piece that makes the powder stick.
Disadvantages:
The reason behind this gun being used the least in the powder industry is mostly because of its disadvantages. One of it biggest flaws is that its a pain to clean. With the insulated conductor charging the powder, you have to completely disassemble the gun when finished to clean out all of the powder. Not just this, but the insulator is also a consumable, which means you will have to replace it. Whereas the corona style does not have a consumable. Another major disadvantage of the tribostatic is that you are only able to use certain powders with it, making it only able to utilize specific powders.
Advantages:
Although the disadvantages seem to out weigh the advantages of this gun, there is actually an advantage to using this system. Since the powder passes through the conductor, it is able to better charge the powder, making the faraday cage effect less likely to occur when powder coating.
Summary:
Each of these guns have their pro’s and con’s. As you can see through our comparison most lean towards the corona powder coating gun, but we’ll let you decided which works best for you. Eastwood offers a great gun at a great price if you’re looking to try a corona. Simply click here to check it out.
New to powder coating? Watch the video below to become a master!