Virtual paint training protects the environment

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By Jennifer DeWitt | Monday, February 11, 2008 | No comments posted

A new virtual technology at Scott Community College is taking the paint out of spray painting while giving students more hands-on training.

Last fall, the Bettendorf campus of the Eastern Iowa Community College District became the nation’s first community college to introduce the new VirtualPaint System in the classroom. Purchased with a $175,000 grant from the Grow Iowa Values Fund, the system is used in the college’s Auto Collision Department to train students who want to learn to paint vehicles as well as other painting applications.

“The system lets them simulate as exactly as they can what they’ll do when they get in the paint booth,’’ said Mike Jund, an auto collision repair instructor. “We have a first-class paint booth in our facility, but this allows students to get much more practice in the applications without the costs involved with using the booth.”

Using a virtual spray gun designed in the same shape and weight of a real spray gun, students point it at an oversized interactive computer screen to simulate the painting process. Using interchangeable spray gun parts, they can paint a variety of shapes on the screen, including a car door.

The computer technology provides the student with instant feedback, including the use of color codes to indicate when they have sprayed too little or too much. It also scores their performance and identifies areas that need improvement.

Currently, the class is included in the curriculum of the auto collision program, but eventually Scott plans to offer a certificate for the VirtualPaint training, said Janet Coogan, the college’s dean of Applied Technologies. “For the industry, this could help them be more marketable in the field.”

As part of the grant, the college also purchased a motor home to enable instructors to take the VirtualPaint system on the road to work directly with industry in training their work force. The grant also covered costs for two full-time instructors, training and materials.

Roy VenHorst, another instructor in the Auto Collision Department, said the system not only saves the college on paint costs, but it decreases the emissions sent into the air and reduces waste.

“This is cutting-edge technology,” he said. “In the past we’ve simulated painting with water in the gun. But that’s like trying to substitute playing golf with a whiffle ball.”

The system was developed by the Iowa Waste Reduction Center at the University of Northern Iowa, Cedar Falls, in partnership with Southwest Research Institute.

Several area body shops helped kick-start the new program — providing the first class of students from their work forces. The companies, whose owners also serve on the Auto Collision Department’s advisory board, include Carl Cleve & Sons, Davenport; Collision Repair Center, Moline; Eldridge Body Shop; and Holmes Body Shop, Muscatine, Iowa.

VenHorst said the college hopes to reach out to area businesses later this year to help train new painters or improve skills of seasoned painters. In addition to body shops, spray applications are used by a wide range of manufacturers, he said, adding that the technology not only applies to paint but to other industrial coatings.

By using computer model as opposed to an actual paint booth, Jund said students actually get more time practicing.

“The learning curve becomes much smoother vs. working with wet applications,” he said, adding that students still will be required to practice with real paint. “But now when they enter the actual paint booth their ability is already far ahead of where it would have been.”

A new class is scheduled to begin this month. For more information, call Jund at (563) 441-4214 or Coogan at (563) 441-4201.

(This story appears in February’s Quad-City Business Journal.)

Jennifer DeWitt can be contacted at (563) 383-2318 or jdewitt@qctimes.com. Comment on this story at qctimes.com.