SPECIALISED TRAINING

SPECIALIZED TRAINING

The ipcm® Academy Course Opens Up to the World of Coil Coating

Monica Fumagalli, ipcm®

For this magazine issue, the ipcm® editorial staff interviewed Sergio Bianchi, a lecturer of the course on coil coating that will be inaugurated by ipcm® Academy in November.

© Novelis

Sergio Bianchi.

The autumn session of the courses organised by ipcm® Academy, the training division of ipcm®, will begin in November with a day devoted to the in-depth study of the continuous coil coating process. We interviewed one of the lecturers, Sergio Bianchi, who has been working in the field of liquid and powder pre-coated aluminium for over twenty years and has already gained training experience at the university level.

What are the training needs of a complex sector such as coil coating?

Continuous-flow coil pre-coating, known as “coil coating”, is an advanced surface finishing process used for various metal substrates, with a total output of several million square metres per year. This is a niche sector, whose technology is not as well known as traditional painting: this is also why it is not easy to find specialised operators. This, in turn, is the reason why I personally believe that training is fundamental not only in terms of teaching the technical concepts needed to deal with this process (made complex by the sub-processes that characterise it and that must be perfectly synchronised to achieve the required quality results), but also of opening up our field to professionals coming from different working environments, perhaps more related to conventional coating, but wishing to study these issues in greater depth. In my years of experience in this sector, I have noticed that there is a lack of an intermediate professional role fitting in between more operational and more theoretical roles. I therefore enthusiastically embraced this new adventure and I am convinced that the course organised by the Academy will help us train exactly these rare professionals. On the other hand, we must ensure the continuity of the sector by training new generations of coil coating experts coming from both universities and technical institutes.

What are the major difficulties encountered in managing this process?

A coil coating plant treats between 10 and 15 metres per second: this already hints at one of its main challenges, namely the speed of the line, which is achieved through perfect integration of mechanics, thermodynamics, electronics, pre-treatment chemicals, and coating chemicals. The ability to manage all these aspects in a system that treats an average of 1000 metres of coil per cycle with a continuous flow is certainly the result of sound knowledge, but above all of experience. This is why I believe that training in this field is crucial, as well as why we will take our trainees to see how this treatment takes place in a longstanding company in the sector, Novelis, headquartered in Bresso, in the province of Milan.

How will the course be organised?

During the first part of the day, I will present the process in all its details: the definition of the product in terms of metal quality, pre-treatment, and type of paint and the components of a continuous-flow liquid or powder coating line. Then, we will visit the company’s coating department and control laboratory to see how this very special process takes place and experience first-hand the qualities of the paints used and the different types of finished products developed. Stefano Prada, an expert in liquid coil coatings, and Emanuele

Magistrelli, a specialist in pre-treatment products, will also speak during the session. I will form a team with them, which will then be supported by our operators during the plant visit.

What goals do you intend to achieve with this new course?

This course is a challenge for me: the variety of expertise levels and backgrounds of the trainees call for clear explanations from me that take nothing for granted. The aim is to train professionals who will then able to deal decisively and quickly with the problems that a coil coating process raises every day. Perhaps more so than in a traditional paint shop, reaction times are tight and action must be taken promptly. With this course, we aim at filling the training gap that characterises the coil pre-coating sector. I personally find that, rather than a specialised course in this field, a structured course such as the one offered by ipcm® Academy is more suited to the purpose, because it is set in a broader coating training context: with these skills, trainees can delve deeper into the subject of coil coating and then continue in that field if they consider it interesting enough. I would like to conclude by saying that, in my opinion, this type of training course will also allow our sector to open up to the wider world of coating more than ever before.

© Novelis © Novelis

© Novelis