new PC system buildup questions

[sage]

I've done my best to search all the threads here for these answers and I've learned a lot but I need to get on with the buildup of a PC system. I purchased quite a few Caswell paint colours that looked good from all the nice pictures you guys have posted. I have a gun. I'm going to build a booth something like one someone posted on here with an exhaust fan sucking out from the back through a furnace filter or a slot in the bottom back of the box and have a Hepa (or similar) filter bag on the end of that to catch the really small powder.
I've decided on a kitchen oven for curing.
The questions that still remain are, should I build this setup out in the garage (which is already full) or can I get away with this in the basement. How much fumes is going to be created by the oven? would a small exhaust fan like a range hood venting out the window take care of any problems there?
I already do anodizing in the basement with NO problems. I have a range hood over the small (6gal) tank and I have no odors in the house with that set up. I'm not sure about the curing oven though.
I'm sure I could give it a try but I don't really want to haul the oven into the basement and wire it up to find it needs to be elsewhere.
Also, does it make any sense to recover powder? Is there a lot wasted? I'm not really concerned if a reasonable percentage is wasted as long as it's a reasonable trade off agains tthe effort to recover it properly. The paint is likely to go out-dated before I use a whole pound anyway, but nodody likes to be foolishly wasteful, I just don't have any experience to know which direction to head yet.
Any advice would help here for a once-in-a-while painter.


Sage

[chromeitout]

I would think you would be fine with the range hood vented out the window. I would probably mount it lower than you would if you were actually going to use the burners. As for "no odors" I wouldn't guarantee that. Now as for the booth someone else may be more help because I don't have one. I use what used to be my automotive paint booth, but I would assume that no matter how good your filtration system is you would probably still miss some powder that would settle in your basement. It probably won't be much but it may be something to think about. Like I said there may be others that will tell you that their booth is "fool proof" and this may not be an issue. Next, recovery is something that I was not concerned about getting started, but now that I've been doing more it has crossed my mind. I would say that around 50%? of what I spray falls to the ground.

[sage]

Thanks for your opinion on that. Like I said I haven't even turned the gun on yet. Sounds like maybe it would be ok to start out in the basement. I can always send the air from the final filtering of the booth out the window too but I'd keep the filters, I would wan't to paint the lawn red.

I have another question. I read elsewhere that the recommended air flow for a spray booth is about 100cfm per square foot of openeing. If I have a 36x36 inch opening which would be comfortable that would be 9sqft I'd need about 900cfm.
I can't relate that to much except to say my friend in the HVAC business says a home furnace fan would be about 1000cfm. He says (and it seems to make sense) that the air would really be whistling through the opening with 900-1000cfm. Is something wrong with that estimate??
Those fans a pretty easy to come by. It would be a good place to start anyway. It could always be pullied down to a lower speed.
Anybody got any other suggestions on the idea?



Sage

[jbotti1]

I have my paint booth setup in the basement. I have my powder booth and oven venting to the outside. I get very little if any fumes. The wife never complained, that is the true test in my opinion. Powder coating has very little fumes compared to regular paint. The only problem I ever had was cleaning the gun after use. When you blow it out it makes a huge dust cloud. Your better off cleaning it outside if you can.
Joe

[sage]

Excellent, thanks for the vote of confidence. Based on this I think I'll go ahead with the basement idea.
Any comments on the CFM of the booth exhaust fan? Maybe a picture of your setup?

Sage

[jbotti1]

I use a 120 CFM bathroom fan with a furnace filter before the fan. Then i plumbed the 3" hose out the window. I also have another fan in the window for ventalation. My booth is something like 3' high, 2.5' wide, 2.5' deep. I should probably have a bigger fan but it works just fine. Tonight i'll take a picture if i remember.

[sage]

Please do. Seems like your fan - which is about 1/10 what the PC book someone made a link to here makes more sense. This probably means the range hood I have might be about the same and re-jigging that might be enough. I'll have to try the range hood.
Does the furnace filter stop enough of the powder? I gathered from another post here that the powder was so fine that you need something like a HEPA filter to stop it. Then again the other person was exhausting back into the room. I'll be going out the window but still I don't really want to paint the side of my or the neighbours house.

Sage

[rreiter]

I have been reading and searching for help on my issue and it looks like you are using the same setup as I do and use it the same as I which is as a hobby. Do you mind if I bounce a couple questions off of you guys or should I just start a new thread?

Russel Reiter
rhreiter@comcast.net