Many fleets take pride in keeping their vehicles not only well maintained but clean. Maintaining clean vehicles helps promote a positive company image. It also helps to protect the vehicle’s paint finish from harsh summer conditions like high temperatures, road debris and grime and bug acid – that can “eat away” at the surface.
Christopher Papa, commercial transportation marketing manager, Axalta Coating Systems (www.axaltacs.com) – a leading global company focused solely on of liquid and powder coatings – says the top causes of on-highway truck finish corrosion, wear and/or rust are:
- Improper washing with acid-based chemicals that have not been properly mixed, applied and rinsed.
- Environmental fallout (acid rain, tree sap, bird droppings, etc.).
- Chips, scratches and mars due to road debris.
“If you are not proactive in repairing a scratch or cracked finish, you could be faced with corrosion on metal surfaces and weakening of the composite, resulting in potential part replacement and paint delamination for non-metallic/composite substrates,” he explains.
Refinish Tips
At what point should a truck be refinished?
“It’s time to consider refinishing trucks when the appearance of the fleet no longer adequately represents the brand that your organization is attempting to portray in the marketplace,” Papa recommends.
To help maintain a truck’s finish, he offers these key maintenance tips:
- Properly clean on a regular basis. A daily rinse is encouraged.
- Utilize a proper PH cleaning solution followed by an appropriate rinse.
- Ensure that acid-based cleaning products are adequately flushed from the vehicle surface.
- Promptly rinse mud or debris from the vehicle, including the undercarriage and wheel wells
Routes
Axalta’s Papa advises that when choosing a coating system for a fleet, “definitely consider the route that the units will run. Trucks running routes off road or that will be spending time around job sites could be exposed to more harmful debris that could potentially damage the coating and substrate.
“Axalta’s recommendation to combat these more severe conditions would be to specify a basecoat/clearcoat system when ordering trucks from the OEM or during repaint scenarios. The additional layer of clearcoat will not only help provide shine and luster that is designed to outlive the life of the truck, but also provides a fleet with an additional layer of protection to defend against the harmful debris that the assets may be exposed to.”
A basecoat, applied after the primer coat, contains the visual properties of color and effects. A clearcoat is a glossy and transparent coating that is typically sprayed on top of a colored basecoat.
Custom Paint
Getting back to company image, Papa observes that branding and messaging of various product offerings and services are becoming more and more important as companies look for ways to differentiate their organization from their competition and “custom colors have played an important role in many companies’ initiatives.
“Over the past five years, Axalta has invested in its Imron Elite system to add additional pigments and effect flakes to provide fleet owners with an extended color pallet for them to choose the color that best represents their organizations and the message that they are looking to promote in the marketplace.
“Some fleet owners have shared with us that custom colors can play a role in helping driver retention,” he adds. “If a particular color palette is not an important element to an organization’s success, allowing drivers to choose the color that best represents their personality can help provide these drivers with an increased degree of satisfaction and help with retention.”
For any fleet considering a custom paint job, Papa says it should take into consideration the desired lifecycle and the environmental conditions that its assets could be exposed to.
“If the assets are expected to be part of the fleet for greater than five years, or may be exposed to extreme conditions, a basecoat/clearcoat system should be considered. A basecoat/clearcoat system is designed to protect the asset with an enhanced degree of durability and gloss retention that should help lead to a longer lifecycle of the asset in extreme weather conditions.”
Papa concludes that overall fleet color and finish quality could affect a company’s reputation. A fleet with unmaintained finishes may negatively impact its company’s position in the marketplace and its reputation among existing customers, and this could make it difficult to win potential customers.
