Fixed Operations
Organizing the Bodyshop Paint Department for Dealers
By Dave Dunn
Visualize bodyshop heaven. What would your paint department look like? Now walk out into your paint department and compare. Do you like what you see? If not, what could your bodyshop manager do to make your shop look a little more like your vision of perfection?
Really, nothing is more important in making a good impression than cleanliness. What is the first thing you would do if you were interested in selling your business? Clean the place up, right? I submit that you are selling your business every day. You sell it to customers, suppliers, insurance adjusters and so on. Moreover, I believe the most important people you sell your business to each and every day are your employees. Every day when they walk into your business they re-evaluate their decision to be employed there. Do they see bodyshop heaven or someplace not so cool?
Clean The Place Up
Generally, paint shops are dirty and unkempt. Due to the frantic pace of things at certain times the painters and preppers often get pretty sloppy. The rationale is that they don't have time to clean up after themselves. The reality is they cannot afford not to clean up after themselves. A dirty, sloppy environment is a more difficult one in which to operate efficiently. Subliminal messages are abundant within any work environment. A sloppy environment spells out lack of precision. A neat and orderly shop sends the message that management and everyone else cares. In my consulting visits to the hundreds of clients I have had over the past 16 years, the one thing that has the most impact on both efficiency and morale is cleanliness.
Brian Evison of Bemack Planning says that the physical environment plays an important role in paint shop productivity. The three components that anyone can address are light, air and sound.
Lighting
Most work areas are too dark. Light level is quantifiable. I recommend 90-foot candles minimum at the working surface of the car in the general shop area; 100-foot candles is the minimum acceptable light level inside the booth. You can purchase a light meter at your electrical light supply store. I can assure you that very few paint departments meet this specification. You can achieve these minimum standards by having a lighting engineer come in and assess your current situation and make recommendations. Usually fluorescent lights need to be lowered to a height of not more than 12 feet from the floor. Metal-halide lights are preferable in extremely high bay situations. Floor coatings can make a big difference in that they increase the reflective ability of the lights. Just think about the power of good lightinglight is associated with activity and darkness is associated with sleep and slumber.
Air
Air quality is a part of the environment that needs to be improved in most shops. People who are surrounded by good air are more productive and morale is better. Generally, ventilation can be improved by installing some make-up-air. An air make-up unit can serve as the heating system in climates requiring heat. The idea is that it is not enough to have an exhaust system which creates only a vacuum. The make-up-air creates a slightly pressurized environment which enables rapid disbursement of airborne particulate.
Sound
Noise is a problem in many facilities. Many pieces of working equipment generate annoying noise. Compressors, booths, fans, sanders, vacuums and radios are the common sources of noise. The first rule of a good design would be to put as many noisy pieces of equipment outside whenever possible. The second rule would be to create sound enclosures for noisy equipment. I almost always recommend that air compressors and air make-up units for booths be installed outside. Rotary screw compressors are great because they make very little noise and usually do not require enclosures. Vacuum sanding pumps definitely are noisy and should be enclosed.
What does all of this have to do with organizing a paint shop? The environment of your shop is influenced equally by physical and cultural issues. If you expect people to operate in an organized way, you must address all areas.
Systems
Systems are important, too, in creating repeatable habits. A written maintenance schedule is essential. Make sure your bodyshop manager has/does the following:
- A log sheet for changing of booth filters is essential.
- A "clean as you go" system for keeping the paint bench and mixing lids clean.
- Adherence to a basic rule at successful shops that no can is put back on the mixing bank without the lid being wiped clean.
- The mixing bench is cleaned after every mixing job. You cannot have the attitude that you can clean it up at the end of the day.
- Paint guns are cleaned to new condition every time they are used.
- Shop floor is scrubbed on schedule daily.
- No paint gun is ever tested by spraying on walls or sides of booth.
- Logs are kept on "no buff" or "dirt free" paint jobs. (This helps because you are now keeping score of the positive instead of the negative.)
- Scheduling of booth time is done with great forethought.
Organization
Organizing the paint shop can be done! Most people consider the paint shop to be a bottleneck when, in fact, the bottleneck is normally a symptom of other problems within the shop. When organizing your schedule for the day your bodyshop manager should consider the following:
- Cars to be painted today.
- Cars to be painted tomorrow.
- Priority of cars today. (In other words if you have 7 cars to be painted today you should number them 1-7 in order of priority).
I mentioned earlier that paint shops often are called bottlenecks when actually the problem is elsewhere in the shop. What I have found is that the average metal shop is actually the culprit when trying to run an organized paint department. If proper attention is given to metal shop scheduling, cars are ready for the paint shop in a regular and timely manner. All too often, very little attention is given to metal shop deadlines and the car is delivered to the paint shop with very little time left to meet the promised delivery date. I recommend that attention be given to metal shop out-times. When the work order is given to the metal technician, he should be informed as to what his expected completion time is, not just the final delivery date. All too often when we assign a job to the metal tech, we set no specific target delivery date for him other than to say "this car goes Friday." The metal technician needs to know when he should have the car out of his stall so as to accommodate the other departments. The paint shop often has to make up for all of the other departments' failures. It is not uncommon for paint shops to work extended hours toward the end of the work week and yet have little or nothing to do on Mondays and Tuesdays.
Booth Time and Flexible Hours
Many times the paint booth is seen as a bottleneck. Often we try to cram too many cars through the booth in one day. This creates quality and morale problems within the shop. Quality suffers because the preparation of the car is rushed and the paint is slammed on because of a desire to get the next car into the booth. Morale suffers because the painters often feel that they are expected to work as long as it takes to get the work out the door when the metal men often leave at 5:00 PM whether the car is done or not.
As already mentioned, it is necessary to give more attention to metal shop scheduling so that the paint work does not hit all at once. However, during certain times, large amounts of paint work are going to be a reality. We recommend flexible paint shop hours: basically, painting cars over an extended shift reduces the bottleneck in the booth. One shop I worked with, having three painters and only one booth, used flexible paint shop hours to their advantage. Painter number one would come in at 5:00 AM. Painter number two would come in at 8:00 AM. Painter number three would come in at 11:00 AM. Each painter would work at least eight hours. Consequently the booth had someone working in it at least fourteen hours per day. Obviously you can more comfortably process more cars in fourteen hours than you can in a typical eight-hour shift. The painters like it because they are not fighting with each other over booth time. I like the overlapping shifts better than a straight first and second shift because there is need for communication between painters and they all are at work part of the day together. You can even rotate between painters as to who works each individual shift.
Organizing your paint shop definitely takes some time and thought. I recommend you and your bodyshop manager review this article together and commit to making the necessary changes immediately. That may lead to the biggest changethe bodyshop knowing that you're involved and you care.
Dave Dunn is the most respected consultant in the field of collision repair management. Dave owns and operates Masters School of Autobody Management in Santa Barbara, Calif. He also owns Dave's Auto Body in Galesburg, Ill. ddunn@dealeronline.com
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