Saw a stat about paint booth airflow that blew my mind

Tbh I was reading through some OSHA guidelines for autobody shops last night between charting at work and found out that most booths need at least 100 feet per minute of air velocity to keep overspray from settling. That really surprised me because I've worked in places where you could barely feel a draft. I guess that explains why some of my clearcoat jobs came out with that rough texture last year. Anyone know a cheap way to test airflow without buying a $300 anemometer?

2 comments

2 Comments

bell.emma16h ago

Oh man, @amyb54 that trash bag trick is genius, I'm definitely trying that this weekend. I had the same rough clearcoat issue a few months back on a silver metallic job and it drove me nuts trying to figure out what went wrong. Turns out the booth filter was totally clogged and airflow was basically nothing. I just held a piece of tissue paper up to the intake and it barely fluttered. After I replaced the filter it was like night and day, the texture went away completely.

amyb5421h ago

Cheap way is a velometer but those aren't much cheaper. You can rig a simple test with a trash bag and a stopwatch though, bag over the exhaust intake and time how long it takes to inflate, that'll give you a rough idea of CFM. Not as accurate as a real meter but good enough to tell if you're way below spec.