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Few striping contractors give much thought to the difficult environment that striping equipment must survive in, and the strain that heavy pavement striping paints put on airless equipment.
Here are six areas of striper maintenance that striping contractors need to be cognizant of at all times to get the best return on the sizable investment made in striping equipment:
- Understand how your striper works
- Piston lubrication
- Corrosion of pump parts
- Internal paint residue
- Packing tension adjustment
- Cleaning is easy, do it daily!
Understand how your striper works
On electric motor-powered airless sprayers, electronic controls start the motor as soon as pressure drops slightly and stop it when the sprayer reaches full pressure.
Line striping equipment utilizes gasoline engines which have to run constantly, so most use an electronic clutch system to engage and disengage the pump from the engine to maintain steady pressure.
If you have a high-capacity pump and are using small orifice spray tips and fairly high engine RPM, that clutch is going to cycle in and out quickly, causing overheating of clutch faces and premature wear. Reducing engine speed drops the pump's output, allowing it to stay engaged longer and saving clutch cycles.
Another important way to avoid the repair shop is not to run your striper with the bucket empty. Paint flow through the pump transfers the heat created by the pumping process away from the packings. If there is no paint to pump and the pump keeps running, internal temperatures can rise literally to the melting point of the packing materials.
So if you run out of paint at the far end of the parking lot, just shut the engine off until you can get a fresh bucket.
Piston lubrication
In this particular case the word "lubrication" is a bit of a misnomer because the piston doesn't need to be lubed to function properly. A thin film of oil needs to remain on the piston to prevent paint from sticking to the piston. If even a small amount of paint that has leaked through the upper packings is allowed to dry on the piston, it can score the packings as the piston moves up and down thru them.
The "wet cup" is a small reservoir for "Throat Seal Oil" lubricant at the top of the paint pump. Keeping oil in the cup ensures the piston will have a thin oil film on it at all times. So if during transport of your machine to the job, or during unloading, it gets tipped sideways, that lubricant could have spilled out and should be replenished before striping begins.
Throat Seal Oil is very inexpensive insurance both in terms of the time it takes to apply it and the cost of the oil itself. This small investment in the prevention of premature packing failure helps avoid loss of days of productivity time and a costly repair bill.
Corrosion of pump parts
Compressing and pumping a corrosive, abrasive material such as latex paint is hard on the internal parts of your spray rig. While most pump parts are made of stainless steel, some of these parts, such as balls and seats in the pump, the spray gun needle and seat, and your spray tips, are made with tungsten carbide.
Tungsten carbide provides the toughness and durability required when a high volume of abrasive fluid like paint is flowing around them under high pressure. However, use of tungsten carbide comes with a challenge for long-term durability because it is very susceptible to corrosion. Because of the high durability factor required, these parts are relatively expensive, too, so you want to make sure they last as long as possible.
A final flushing of the pump (after all paint has been removed) with water and some pump conditioner prevents this corrosive process from starting on those key components. There are limitations to the corrosive prevention this system provides because over time the pump conditioner can separate from the water it is immersed in, and the protection then breaks down. If you plan to use your machine within a week or two, the water and pump conditioner mix should do the job.
For longer periods of inactivity, and in cold climates where freezing is possible, a 50-50 mix of oil and mineral spirits is recommended. Make sure this mix is thoroughly flushed with warm soapy water before attempting to put paint in and stripe with it.
Internal paint residue
As a manufacturer of airless striping equipment for almost 30 years we have seen people making a living striping that never clean their machine.
The problem with not flushing your pump daily is that some of that paint inevitably sticks to the internal walls of the pump, hose, and spray gun. Low VOC paints seem to separate faster, increasing this problem (it varies among paint manufacturers and in different geographical regions as well). Separation can result in lumps of the heavy material forming in the bottom of the hose loops, or in the nooks and crannies of the spray gun head. Those pieces will periodically dislodge and either "come out spitting" or deposit themselves in a way that blocks the flow of paint. This will require you to clean your gun filter too often and reverse your spray tip to clear clogs.
But even if these symptoms don't occur, a slight build-up inside the hose has the same effect that high cholesterol has over time in humans: it makes the heart of the machine — the pump — work harder every cycle. This increases wear and tear on your pump, requiring more frequent repacks and piston replacements.
Packing tension adjustment
Not all pumps have external packing adjustment capabilities, as some compensate for wear with internal spring tension. Some pumps only offer external adjustment of upper packings.
On those designed to allow external adjustment, by taking advantage of that capability you can extend packing life substantially by increasing the pressure on the packings to take up the slack caused by normal wear. Our tests show a three-fold increase in packing life can be achieved through external adjustment. Read pump documentation for the correct procedure.
Cleaning is easy, do it daily!
Many contractors say flushing takes too much time, and since time is money they are saving money by not bothering to clean up their machines.
But flushing airless machines has never been easier. Many of today's airless striping machines have built-in cleaning systems which do the job while the machine is unattended.
If yours doesn't have a self-cleaning system, you can buy an adapter that enables you flush unattended. It works with any brand of sprayer, and lets you get latex paint out of the hose, gun, and pump in less than 5 minutes. To use the adapter just remove the tip and guard, and thread on the adapter, which connects a standard garden hose to your spray gun. Pull the gun trigger and let water pressure from the hose push the paint back through the airless hose and back into your paint bucket via the pressure relief line. When you see clear water coming through that line (typically less than 2 minutes with 50 feet of hose), remove your paint bucket, wipe down the suction tube and filter. Now you're ready to final flush the pump, hose, and gun with a mix of clean water and pump conditioner.
However you get it done, if you eliminate residue collection and prevent internal corrosion, you can be confident your equipment is ready make money for you tomorrow, and the next day, and the next.
Mark Malloy is director of marketing for Airlessco, which makes a Quick Flush Adapter for striper flushing. www.airlessco.com.
author: By Mark Malloy