PRETREATMENT

GreenerGrass
Through
Pretreatment
Changes
Manufacturer Agri-Fab changes
pretreatment for zero discharge.
BY TIM PENNINGTON EDITORABOVE: Parts move along the coating line at Agri-Fab.

1880 YEARS THE VOICE OF FINISHING

Some of the best-looking lawns in the United States got their startat a manufacturing plant in Sullivan, Illinois, where the employees
at Agri-Fab make the tools that make yardwork look easy.
Agri-Fab is best known for making lawn care products suchas sweepers, spreaders and lawn carts, both for its own line ofproducts, as well as for other major OEMs, such as John Deere.
The 300,000-square-foot facility—which houses AF Manufacturing—offers all types of manufacturing services such asmachining, laser, stamping, welding, assembly, tooling, tube
bending/forming and coatings.
The quality is such that, last year, Agri-Fab received John Deere’s
Achieving Excellence Partner award, as well as the John Deere
Service Parts Supplier of the Year award.
“Agri-Fab is willing to do whatever it takes to meet customer
demand,” says Gerlanna Patterson, a John Deere supply chain
manager who spoke to Agri-Fab employees at a lunch to celebrate theawards. “They consistently align with John Deere goals and processes.
Agri-Fab is up to the challenge.”

MAY 2016 — PFonline.com

PRETREATMENT CHANGES

Recently, that challenge included making major changes toits coating operations, specifically becoming a zero-discharge
phosphate operation and achieving John Deere F17-approved
supplier status, better known as JDM F17, an enterprise specification for paint performance.

Pretreat Change
Changing its pretreatment had been discussed for some timesince the town of Sullivan had started regulating phosphates
in its treatment plants, which meant that soon Agri-Fab would
be unable to discharge direct to the municipal sewer.
“We had been looking internally at some changes we wanted
to make to our system, and going to zero discharge was one ofthem,” Doug Moore, an Agri-Fab manufacturing engineer, says.
“A lot of those changes were to meet our customer’s requirements, not only in process but in the coatings.”
Sullivan allows up to three parts per million phosphorousin a discharge, and Agri-Fab has been using an iron phosphatesystem that Moore says was generating a lot more than what
was allowed, which meant the company was paying a fairly
large fee to dispose of the contents off site.
Of equal importance was meeting the JDM F17 paintperformance requirements for John Deere products, which
defines specifications for simple parts, assembled components
and fully assembled equipment.
JDM F17 called out corrosion resistance standards such as
salt-spray, cyclic corrosion and humidity resistance. It also
set physical property requirements for primers and topcoats,including pencil hardness, dry adhesion, elongation andimpact resistance. In addition, certain chemical resistancerequirements—for items such as engine
oil and coolant, as well as gasoline anddiesel fuel—also needed to be met.
“So we had our customer needs
and we had our own internal needs tochange our system, including trying
to save energy costs by going tosomething with more of an ambient
temperature for the the washers andthe baths,” Moore says.

Agri-Fab selected Calvary’s Cal Clean 944NP, Advantech
610A and S1488 for the chemicals in the treatment baths.

Zero Discharge
In late 2014, Agri-Fab met with
Calvary Industries (Cincinnati,Ohio) about working to convert
its pretreatment line to get to thezero discharge requirement forphosphates, as well improving
efficiencies and lowering costs.
Agri-Fab makes lawncare products such as
sweepers, spreaders andlawn carts.
PRODUCTS FINISHING — PFonline.com

80 YEARS THE VOICE OF FINISHING

19PRETREATMENT
convinced MTD to invest in Agri-Fab as a joint venture.
Tom Boland, Calvary’s sales manager for its central region,
Ron Harshman, who is current chairman of the board ofsays that the pretreatment process that Agri-Fab was using
AF Holdings, was one of the original six who started thewas a traditional detergent iron-phosphate, commonlyventure. It was in 1982 that Agri-Fab decided to sell directly
referred to as a cleaner/coater. It was also running an acidic
to mass merchandisers, which lead to the development of newsealer in the final stage.
products, including the redesign of a dual-stage lawn sweeper“Our recommendation was to go to a 5-stage processthat surpassed Sears’ sweeper in its own testing, thereby
that included some newer chemistries that would meet thewinning “Sears’ Best” recognition.
company’s needs, and save them operating costs,” Boland
says. “It would also give them a greater level of control of theirfinishing operations.”
Expansion
Agri-Fab needed to be consistent in its coating applications
With that early success, Agri-Fab began expanding its manufor the markets it served,
facturing capabilities in the early 1990s to meetwhich included pulleycustomers’ potential needs. The company acquired
Every adjustment wasproducts, commercial
Clark Pulley in Russellville, Alabama, and launchedseating, grain and livestock,
Hydro-Gear in a partnership with Sauer-Sundstrand
previously done by hand,utility vehicle equipment,
to build transmissions, pumps and transaxles, successso stepping up into an
lawn and garden, tractor
which has seen Hydro-Gear grow to facilities in eightautomated system was atransmission, riding lawnstates, Europe and China.
equipment, heavy equipJust as Agri-Fab was starting to grow, it saw intense
big improvement.
ment, water utilities,
regulations on liquid-paint spraying that soon required
fitness, oil pipeline, handlarge manufacturing operations to convert to a hightool tubing and snow removal.
solids paint, which, at the time, caused Agri-Fab a large expense
Quality in its manufacturing process—and specificallyand operational issues.
how its coatings applications have held up in very harsh
In the early 1990s, the company installed four powderconditions—has been a trademark of Agri-Fab since 1975,
coating spray booths in a newly constructed paint building,when the original owner, Yardman, sold the product line towhich eliminated air pollution and hazardous waste, whileMTD-Cleveland and closed the factory. That’s when six ofincreasing customer satisfaction because of the improved
the Yardman staff members—along with other members ofquality of its product’s appearance.
their local church—purchased the facility and equipment andSean Ruppert, director of marketing for Agri-Fab, says thatat peak season the company
has nearly 400 employees,
which is impressive in a townof 4,700. Nearby, Hydro-Gearemploys nearly 700, whichmakes AF Holdings one of themost important companies inthe region.
The Agri-Fab facility today
has some of the most advanced
fabrication and machining
technology on any shop floor, as
well as lasering, tube bending
and welding.
The finishing line consists ofa dip paint line and dual powder
coating lines. The liquid line applies
a black baked enamel with a part
window of 24 by 48 by 12 inches,with a 70-pound rack limit. The total
weight through is about 560 pounds
Agri-Fab’s paint line earned
the John Deere’s Achieving
Excellence Partner Award.
2080 YEARS THE VOICE OF FINISHING

MAY 2016 — PFonline.com

PRETREATMENT CHANGES

More Uniformity

Agri-Fab uses Calvary’s Cal-Eye 1000 chemical
automation and computing system because of its
simplicity of use, data collection properties andcustomization possibilities.
per minute, or 34,000 pounds per hour. The powder lines havea 40 by 60 by 24-inch window and the racks can handle up to200 pounds. The line includes four Nordson spray booths anda Gema Quick Change powder booth.

Reducing Costs
But, of course, the main concern for Calvary and Boland wasto get the new pretreatment line in and operating so that
Agri-Fab could meet all its needs and start reducing costs, too.
Boland says that Calvary’s technical team understood thatmany alkaline cleaners contain tetrapotassium pyrophosphate, so they constructed a phosphate-free alkaline cleaner,
which contains properties to clean equally well, but sludge
substantially less.
The company selected Calvary’s Cal Clean 944NP,
Advantech 610A and S1488 for the chemicals in the treatment baths, enabling the entire pretreatment system to be 100
percent phosphate free. The 610A brand is a zirconium treatment and the S1488 is a non-chrome seal rinse.
“We decided to use 610A and S1488 because of its performance characteristics, as well as having been previously
approved in a John Deere painting process,” Boland says.
It was also during this time that Agri-Fab learned of theCalvary’s Cal-Eye 1000 chemical automation and computing
system, mostly because of its simplicity of use, data collection
properties and customization possibilities.
The basic part of the system monitors washers and ovens,plus provides for automated chemical feed, as well as logging
downtime. The system can be expanded to include items
such as paint, conveyor, parts tracking and wireless filmthickness reading.

“The system maintains more uniform chemical concentration to reduce costs, while improving quality,” says Austin
Morelock, business development manager for Calvary
Industries. “It reduces gas use by using an energy saving
mode when parts are not being processed. Knowing what
and where parts are on the line can initiate cost saving
procedures and production information.”
Moore says that every adjustment was previously doneby hand, so stepping up into an automated system was abig improvement.
“We were managing the pH levels and the concentration of just one solution ourselves,” Moore says. “But withthe new system, we can generate many reports and look at
any trending that may be occurring so that we can address
them quickly.”
The system was validated through testing that wasconducted using an independent outside paint supplier andAgri-Fab put the line into operation.
“We got the line to run pretty much the way we wanted it tofairly quickly,” Moore says. “As with everything new, we hadsome time to see if the output numbers would reflect what wethought we would get, and everything was very positive.”Agri-Fab saw a little higher evaporation rate than it had
run in the past, but because they are running both powder
coating lines through the same pretreatment system, theyalways have a higher coating rate than other similar shops.
Todd Harris, Agri-Fab’s contract sales manager who works
with clients such as John Deere, says it has been great for hiscompany to let current and potential customers know about
its equipment and technology upgrades.
“Without question, it is a good thing that we can meettheir specifications and requirements very well,” he says.
“They are always wanting to make sure we have thosecapabilities.”
The byproduct, too, is how Agri-Fab has improved its environmental impact and energy usage, a question that manyOEMs ask their suppliers.
“We are confident that our paint system performanceexceeds industry norms, and in our market we are still aheadof the curve,” Moore says.
For information on Agri-Fab and AF Manufacturing,
visit agri-fab.com. For information on Calvary Industries,
visit calvaryindustries.com.

Full-Throttle Pretreatment at Yamaha’sEcoat, Powder Coating LineA cross-functional team makes a change in Yamaha’s
pretreatment line with help from supplier Calvary
Industries.
short.PFonline.com/yamaha

PRODUCTS FINISHING — PFonline.com

80 YEARS THE VOICE OF FINISHING

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