Paint Gun Cleaners And Paint Guns

They are also not a very robust tool, which is why paint gun manufacturers go to a great deal of trouble producing explicit instructions for their care and maintenance.  The nozzle in particular is easily damaged and a damaged nozzle can seriously affect the quality of the resulting paint job.

For the hobbyist or home user, cleaning paint guns is usually done manually as per manufacturer's instructions.  It's not a difficult job but can be time consuming and care needs to be taken to dispose of used cleaning solvent in an environmentally responsible way.  Incidentally, even after using water based paints, the same environmentally responsible aspect applies with respect to used cleaning water.

Paint guns being used in a commercial establishment require far more frequent cleaning because they're in far more regular use.  Cleaning is usually done in between jobs and / or paint colour / type changes and definitely on a daily basis.  For this reason most businesses that use paint guns have invested in a paint gun cleaner for a variety of reasons.

Reasons For Using A Paint Gun Cleaner

A good paint gun cleaner saves time and in a busy environment this is a very important consideration.  In most cases it's simply a case of giving the paint gun a quick pre-clean before hooking it up to the gun cleaner and letting its high pressure features, air flushing and swirl action jets do the rest of the cleaning for you.  All up the cleaning process generally takes around a minute and the paint gun is then ready to be reused or stored away. 

Mechanical gun cleaners use considerably less cleaning solvent compared to manual cleaning because they're programmed to make efficient use of as little solvent as possible.  They may also use re-circulated solvents in some parts of the cleaning process.  This not only reduces the amount of waste solvent being produced, which is better for the environment, but also cuts costs.  Less solvent being used means less money spent on buying solvent and less waste being produced saves on waste disposal fees.

Most gun cleaners are guaranteed not to cause damage to paint guns during the cleaning process so long as they're used strictly in accordance with the manufacturer's instructions.  This includes only using solvents that are recommended by the paint manufacturer.  The most commonly used cleaning solvents are water (for water based paints), acetone, methylated spirits and lacquer thinners.  Some types of chemicals, like chlorinated hydrocarbon solvents, are not recommended for cleaning paint guns because they react chemically with aluminum and galvanized components in the gun. 

It's also advisable not to use the same spray gun for both solvent-based paints and water based paints.  This is because the cleaning solvents used to clean up solvent-based paints are not usually compatible with water-based paints and may adversely affect the quality of the finished water based paint job.

Gun cleaners are guaranteed to do a thorough and professional clean, which ensures optimal equipment functionality and increases the reliability and longevity of the gun.

Gun cleaners are environmentally friendly because the used cleaning solvent or rinsing water is collected in special buckets or built-in recyclers, allowing it to be disposed of responsibly, or recycled.  In fact, in many states VOC regulations require establishments that use paint guns to have gun cleaners installed for this reason.

And finally, using a paint gun cleaner also reduces exposure to potentially harmful cleaning solvents and paint residues. 

Source : articlesbase.com