Someone needs to pinch Jim Leidig, the General Manager of Matrix Finishing in Harrington, Delaware.

For the last year, Leidig has had the dream job of designing and building — and now running —a hi-tech powder coating operation that would be the envy of any finishing applicator in the land.

When it came time to buy the equipment needed to run the 65,000-square-foot facility, it was Leidig’s bosses who insisted that he go high-end on the equipment and supplies he needed. 

“One of the majority partners was very insistent that we buy only the best equipment we could find,” Leidig says. “He kept saying, ‘We ought to do this, and let's get this automatic chemical addition and monitoring on all the chemicals for the washer.’ We were putting this in, and it was like, ‘Man, I haven't even seen half of this equipment before.’”

Design and Building From Scratch

Jim Leidig, GM of Matrix Finishing, and Julie Paskey, Operations Manger, in their new powder coating booth.Additionally, having such technologically advanced application equipment is not the only benefit; Leidig was also able to design and build the structure from scratch without the constraints of installing conveyor lines and batch systems in an already established location.

The result is remarkable, and Leidig says it makes Matrix Finishing one of the largest powder-coating operations on the East Coast.

With a vestibule opening of 4 feet by 8 feet, they are capable of coating 30-foot lengths; even more,  they also can coat from 43 to 50-foot parts “if we bypass,” Leidig says. Their oven is 90 feet long, and the system comes equipped with a five-stage washer and pretreatment system.

As Leidig designed the facility several years ago, he ensured that there was sufficient space for proper shipping and receiving, including designated areas for unloading and loading parts onto trucks.

“ One of the partners owns a manufacturing company, and he can never find powder coating to take care of his operations. And when he did find someone, it seemed he could never get a quote. I didn’t understand why that was a problem.”

“We also have extensive trucking area with 53-foot drop bodies that are open,” he says. “We have Conestogas, and we have box trailers that are 53 feet, and everything on down from there.”

Improving Shipping and Receiving Capabilities

Leidig says it makes Matrix Finishing one of the largest powder-coating operations on the East CoastFor Leidig, even the shipping area was something that took some thinking and planning to get it right.

“With shipping and receiving, that's an art form in itself,” he says. “It's one thing to get the part powder coated and on a pallet, and it's another thing to get it out of here and wrapped up perfectly so it hits your customer intact.”

The Matrix Finishing facility has been open for just over a year. Still, its development has been years in the making, dating back to when the owners approached Leidig about starting the company from scratch due to a basic necessity.

“ One of the partners owns a manufacturing company, and he can never find powder coating to take care of his operations,” Leidig says. “And when he did find someone, it seemed he could never get a quote. I didn’t understand why that was a problem.”

Leidig’s experience with powder coating was that he was on the buying end of it during a career in manufacturing. When he was approached about running Matrix Finishing, he met with a landowner to find a suitable area to locate the facility.

“He decided to build a building, and we're leasing it,” Leidig says. “We got some capital and purchased the right equipment that we needed.”

Meeting Certifications to Attain AAMA 2605

Matrix Finishing worked with John Bradshaw from Slocum Equipment to help design and install the main components of the system. One of those purchases was a washer system that would help Matrix Finishing meet the certifications required to attain AAMA 2605 credentials, enabling the company to pursue larger architectural finishes.

The five-stage washer — and actually, it has a sixth stage, Leidig says, if you include the Halo rinse – that preps the material properly for a long-lasting coating needed to meet the specs.

“ We use an alkaline cleaner, a rinse RO water, and the fifth stage is zirconium,” he says. “The zirconium spray is where you get your AAMA 2605. Then we go to a dry-off booth, it makes a turn, comes into a Gema environmental room where there's a Magic Booth with 12 automatic guns and two manual stations.”

Leidig says the powder coating is 100% reclaimed — “All the latest and greatest equipment,” he adds — and the parts head to the 90-foot-long one-turn oven where they come out, taken down off the line, and packaged.

“This system took a life of its own once we were let loose to design a system for the customer.”

Matrix Finishing worked with John Bradshaw from Slocum Equipment to help design and install the main components of the system. Slocum provides powder coating systems and industrial finishing equipment, offering turnkey solutions, batch systems, pretreatment, powder coating booths, ovens, and application equipment for finishers.

Leidig also ensured that the different component manufacturers and suppliers were all on the same page as he and Bradshaw worked to assemble all the pieces.

System Took On ‘A Life Of Its Own’

Parts head to the 90-foot-long one-turn oven where they come out, taken down off the line, and packaged.“John Bradshaw and his team at Slocum — plus the people at GAT — they are very good at what they do,” he says. “They know what they are doing, and that is very important.”

Bradshaw says he has known Leidig for over 25 years and enjoyed the chance to work with him on the powder coating system. He had previously sold him two other GAT systems for companies where Leidig worked.

“This system took a life of its own once we were let loose to design a system for the customer,” he says. “We did the design work based upon the AAMA spec, and once the system was designed, we then gave it to the customer to have a building built that would compliment the system’s ability to produce. The thought process was, ‘If we can do AAMA, we can do anything. It was kind of a ‘build it and they will come.’”

John BradshawBradshaw has been representing GAT and networking with powder application companies and powder suppliers for over 30 years and says the symmetry of their companies is extensive.

“Once I gave the initial specs, they ran with it and came up with a ‘do-all’ system,” he says. “Matrix can run a bit slower when doing heavy, long parts and ramp up the speed when they are running sheet metal parts. From a salesman’s point of view, it was a perfect scenario; the customer gave us carte blanche, and we delivered exactly what was expected.”

“I’ll put this nicely, but there are some individuals out there who promise you everything and fail to deliver. We guarantee your part, and we handle pickup and delivery. We pick up one day, and we deliver the next. If I tell you it's a 24-hour delivery, it's a 24-hour delivery.”

The added benefit of having a 65,000-square-foot complex is the ability to store parts both before and after they are coated.

“We have a lot of storage room here,” Leidig says. “We make sure our customer parts are not left out in the rain. As soon as it is done with their fabrication, it's brought here, and we stow it in the back. We finish it, and we distribute the parts as needed. I used to be the end user for years. I've been involved in engineering and manufacturing for 40 years. As the end user, nothing has upset me more than visiting a powder coater and seeing my items sitting in their parking lot before and after processing. And then having them tell me that some of my parts are missing.”

 With the AAMA 2605 program, Matrix Finishing already holds certifications from IFS Coatings, TCI Powder Coatings, Sherwin-Williams, and Tiger Drylac, making it available to undertake a variety of coating projects for extruders and architectural manufacturers.

“ I am a chronic overdoer,” Leidig says. “I made sure we had approvals through four different suppliers.”

Building Partnerships with Manufacturing Sectors

Aside from the architectural and extruder industries, Matrix Finishing is building partnerships with several other manufacturing sectors, including conveyor builders. That often makes the work a tad bit tedious because Leidig says yellow is often a difficult color to powder coat.

“We do a lot of yellow, and it’s a very hard color to coat because you usually can't get good coverage on it,” he says. “It's such a heavy powder., and it is hard sometimes to get that mill thickness on there. But we've made recipes in the booth, and now we've got it down to a science. I tell our people, ‘It doesn't matter how much powder you spray because we reclaim everything.’ Usually, when you spray to waste, you only get 25 square feet per pound. If you reclaim, you can get 50.”

Matrix Finishing is also receiving a significant amount of work from new data centers being constructed on the East Coast, as well as from the building trades that are assembling those facilities.

“We are getting work from the manufacturers who make the equipment for the AC and the distribution cabinets for those data centers,” Leidig says.

As soon as the drawings for the facility and the equipment were completed and the equipment was ordered, Leidig and his team began spreading the word to manufacturers and other businesses in the area that a new powder coating provider would be available to finish their parts.

As Leidig built a potential customer base within a customer relationship management program, he also began investigating what manufacturers were planning to hire more workers. The correlation was that whoever was hiring would soon be producing equipment and machinery that would need to be coated in some fashion.

“ You find out what industry is hiring, and then you'll see the trend in the industry,” he says. “That's the most important thing you need to look at. Plus, it’s a lot of word of mouth. I’ll put this nicely, but there are some individuals out there who promise you everything and fail to deliver. We guarantee your part, and we handle pickup and delivery. We pick up one day, and we deliver the next. If I tell you it's a 24-hour delivery, it's a 24-hour delivery, and there are a lot of companies that need that, and they're willing to pay accordingly.”

Having a Great Staff to Grow the Company

Of course, Leidig acknowledges that he needs a great staff that will help Matrix Finishing stand behind those promises. They have 11 staff members and plan to expand as the business continues to grow.

“I have a great team of people here,” he says. “The saying around here is, ‘We don't leave until your parts are done.’ And that is very much true.  We have a core of 11 fantastic people who are committed to being here. I treat them like gold.  There's nothing like donuts in the morning, something for lunch, and if there's anything left, take it home.”

Visit https://matrixfinishing.com.