Shuttles for 53 ft. Parts Create Flexible Finishing Opportunity
Load Trail installed an IntelliFinishing automated finishing system capable of finishing trailers up to 53’ long and up to 10,000 lbs. per carrier at their Sulphur Springs, Texas facility.
After final weld, trailers are loaded immediately on a carrier within each of their nine weld lanes. The trailers are then conveyed forward at 56' per minute onto a primary shuttle which moves sequentially and laterally at 42' per minute, entering into each process step, and reversing out of that process area.
Via the conveyor, each trailer part is shuttled to:
- An automatic shot blast which removes rust, mill scale, slag and other imperfections
- A manual blast booth that allows operators to touch-up areas missed in auto-blast
- A two-stage automatic washer
- A dry-off oven where times and temperatures can be modified to trailer or part substrates
- One of three holding lanes for final cleaning and quality inspections
- A prime coat booth
- One of two top-coat powder paint booths
- One of three available cure ovens, where recipe-based control allows for maximum flexibility depending on part substrates or differences in powder cure specifications
- One of two unload stations where the newly powder-coated trailer is unloaded for final assembly
- And then via the secondary shuttle, empty carriers head back to the weld lanes to repeat the process
The IntelliFinishing system is an extremely flexible, bolt together finishing system that can handle very large or long products or even a wide range of product sizes and weights; often in a tight footprint. Intuitive conveyor controls integrated with each piece of process equipment ensures that every trailer and trailer part achieve its own optimal finish.
IntelliFinishing systems typically cost much less to operate compared to conventional systems as well.