How a Coating Line Efficiently Meets the Color Modification Needs of Different Car Wheel?
Author：
Chuangzhi Coating
In the automotive aftermarket and modification sector, the demand for wheel color modification is increasingly diversified—from classic glossy black and gunmetal gray to personalized matte blue and gradient colors. Wheel of different materials (aluminum alloy, steel) and sizes (15-inch to 22-inch) place higher requirements on coating processes. For wheel production and modification enterprises, configuring a separate coating line for each color modification need will significantly increase equipment investment and workshop space costs. As a professional coating line equipment manufacturer, we enable a car wheel coating line to flexibly meet the color modification needs of various types of wheel through three core technologies.
1. Flexible Hardware Design to Adapt to Multi-Specification Wheel
Traditional coating lines are often limited by fixed conveyor tracks and spraying stations, making it difficult to be compatible with wheel of different sizes. Our coating line adopts amodular conveyor system, which can quickly adjust the track spacing and hanger height according to the wheel diameter. Both 15-inch household wheel and 22-inch modified wheel can flow smoothly without replacing the conveyor equipment. Meanwhile, the interior of the spraying booth is equipped withliftable spray gun robotic arms. Through preset programs, the angle and distance of the spray guns are automatically adjusted. Whether it is a conventional five-spoke wheel or a complex multi-spoke hollow wheel, 360° dead-angle-free spraying can be achieved, avoiding paint missing and sagging caused by differences in wheel structures.
In addition, in response to the pre-treatment needs of wheel made of different materials, the coating line integrates amulti-stage pre-treatment module: Aluminum alloy wheel need to go through degreasing and passivation treatments to enhance coating adhesion, while steel wheel require an additional rust removal process. Each module can be switched with one click through the PLC control system, eliminating the need for manual process adjustment and ensuring uniform color modification effects for wheel of different materials.
2. Intelligent Control System for Rapid Color Switching
Color switching efficiency is a key factor affecting the adaptability of the coating line. Our coating line is equipped with anintelligent color matching system. When staff input the target color code (such as Pantone color card, original automotive color code), the system automatically calculates the paint ratio and controls the paint supply system to accurately deliver the corresponding color paste. Compared with traditional manual paint mixing, the color matching accuracy is improved to ±0.5ΔE. When switching colors, the paint supply pipeline can be quickly cleaned through the high-pressure cleaning function, and the -color switching time is shortened to less than 15 minutes.
At the same time, the coating line is equipped with aMES production management system, which can real-time store the coating parameters (such as spraying pressure, baking temperature, curing time) of different wheel . When producing wheel of different models, the system automatically retrieves historical parameters, eliminating the need for repeated debugging. For example, when switching from spraying 18-inch glossy black wheel to 20-inch matte silver wheel, it only takes 3 minutes to complete the equipment parameter adjustment, greatly improving production flexibility.
3. Customized Process Solutions to Meet Special Color Modification Needs
In addition to conventional single-color coating, the market demand for special color modification of wheel (such as two-color splicing, wire drawing + coating composite process) is increasing year by year. We can addcustomized process modulesto the coating line according to customer needs: For two-color wheel, a positioning spraying device is added, and the robotic arm accurately controls the spraying area to achieve seamless connection between the two colors; For the wire drawing + coating process, a wire drawing unit and a transparent coating spraying module are integrated. First, the wheel surface is wire-drawn, and then a protective coating is sprayed, taking into account both personalized appearance and durability.
Taking an automotive parts manufacturer as an example, through a customized coating line, it can simultaneously produce three types of color-modified wheel (single-color, two-color, wire-drawn). The equipment utilization rate is increased by 60%, and the production cost is reduced by 35%, which fully verifies the adaptability advantage of the flexible coating line.
Conclusion
At a time when the demand for wheel color modification is increasingly diversified, a coating line with flexibility, intelligence, and customization capabilities has become a core equipment for enterprises to reduce costs and increase efficiency. As a coating line equipment manufacturer, we always take customer needs as the guide, optimize equipment performance through technological innovation, and help customers easily cope with the color modification production of various types of wheel to seize market opportunities.
