5 Must Have Tools for the Die-Hard Painters

Paint techs always looking for ways to increase productivity, save time, and stay on the cutting edge of technology. These 5 paint tools are must-have items for anyone wanting to take their paint-work to the next level!

Paint Mil Thickness Gauge

Verifying how much material you have at any given stage will ensure that your paint jobs will hold up long term. A digital mil thickness gauge can quickly tell you if you have enough primer to ensure proper holdout over body filler, or enough clearcoat to guarantee the basecoat will not fade.

Walcom Air Blower

The Walcom version is an upgraded version of the plastic air blade, but much more durable and a bigger fan. These dryers are an absolute must for waterborne users. They will help you flash off jobs very quickly and are small enough to carry with you to prevent them from getting covered in overspray. Get it here.

Digital Microscope

most commonly found in the paint labs, microscopes, in general, are very helpful when evaluating pearls and metallic sizes. A digital microscope can be useful when creating a color, severely altering one, or diagnosing a poor match. Looking at your pigments under a microscope can also help you better determine the correct metallic toner when tinting. They can also help you identify the coarseness of a scratch.

Viscosity Cup

From time to time, you will experience some product inconsistencies. Solvents can evaporate and can cause your traditional mixing ratio to be incorrect. To test your product viscosity, you will fill the cup with product and time how long it takes to drain. It should fall into the acceptable range specified on your product data-sheet. There are different types of viscosity cups with different flow rates so the tests are specific to a particular via city cup. (Product sheets will specify the cup type they used for testing)

UV Flashlights

if you’ve ever found yourself in a tough spot and needed something fixed yesterday, UV curing prime is most likely the answer. In recent years, LED technology has led to low power UV curing flashlights that can dry a small area of primer in under 20 seconds. They can be used on a bigger scale and virtually eliminate drying time. There is no better time to look closer at this technology.

Do you have a suggestion, not on the list? Tell us about it in the comments!