Dürr, Bietigheim-Bissingen, Germany, is the general contractor installing two paint shops, each with two topcoat lines, at Changan Ford Automotive’s Chongqing and Hangzhou locations. The new lines include processes that save energy and reduce the footprints of the paint shops.

In the Chongqing, China, location, the company is using the three-wet high solid process, a wet-in-wet process that does not use an oven between painting steps. Ford is also introducing a three-wet water-based process at the plant in Hangzhou , which complies with new environmental regulations in China.

 The use of heat recovery from the oven’s exhaust air saves energy. Changan Ford uses the oven’s exhaust heat for heating the supply air of the spray booth. An additional energy-saving measure is Ford’s use of air recirculation in the automatic zones of the spray booths.