College Senior Needs Help With Spray Booth Best Practices

[Sean Ryan]

I'm a student at Keene State College in Keene, NH. I am working on a safety program for the campus wood shop for my senior capstone class which is needed for my bachelor's in Safety Studies.

Right now I am focusing on the spray booth and in need of some professional help or suggestions. The booth has many problems including no air filter and lack of fire protection. I have NFPA documents as well as OSHA but I am looking for BEST PRACTICES, not just what OSHA wants, since schools are not covered by them anyway. I need to dazzle my professor as well as the Dean on a safe booth.

If anyone has any examples, material or links that are solid enough to propose to my school it would be greatly appreciated. Also if you need a more detailed description of the booth to make a fair assessment I will do so.

Thank you!

[dpb]

Sean Ryan wrote: ...

As one additional amplification of my previous post--

If you haven't yet either got a detailed prospectus of the content and objectives of your project discussed and approved I'd suggest an appointment w/ advisor/prof/the_however_your_dept_handles_it_person and come to a specific documented agreement as to what is the actual point of the research.

Are you, indeed, attempting to write an actual proposal that could realistically be implemented and if so, what are the budget and other project constraints within which your project would have to fit? That's one type of project, more like what I had in mind in previous posting.

If, otoh, it really is a "blue-sky, wouldn't it be nice if" kind of exercise, that's also a possibility that a Department or College could investigate in a more exploratory vein. One need to have a vision and a plan if there is some major expansion or building campaign or somesuch similar idea floating around.

The point is, you need to have a specific objective in mind.

The other thing I'd suggest, particularly if the first of the two directions is more nearly the idea is to talk with folks who are knowledgeable in two areas--first, the staff who are currently responsible for the present facility and its operation and compliance w/ whatever _are_ their rules regarding it, and second, the accrediting organization for the school and/or department(s) affected if they have a subsidiary accreditation process. These people have an inordinate amount of leverage in all phases of academia and may well have in place a set of guidelines and standards such facilities must meet as well as standards of their own or references to other industry standards that indicate what their assessment of ideal is. Then, otoh, they may not, but I'd surely investigate to know/find out. One thing you would definitely _not_ want to do would be to recommend something in contradiction w/ such guidelines (or to point out deficiencies in existing facilities might also be quite embarrassing if one didn't at least know a priori one was doing same).

Oh, one other thought...is this, indeed, a woodworking finishing facility and what kind(s) of work? I'd also suggest you look at other schools of renown and find out what they're doing in similar programs. That is, what would be suitable for a program concentrated on commercial furniture manufacturing or similar would undoubtedly be quite different from the needs of a program concentrating on fine cabinetmaking or artistic woodworking.

W/O knowing any specifics of your programs I'll not even try to list comparable institutions; you surely have far better knowledge to find suitable ones...

Good luck...

[nailshooter41]

Read everything dpb said. That's the best way to approach this.

Since at one time my finishing/refinishing was going quite well, I was thinking of renting a space and setting up a small finishing/ refinishing shop. The amount of work it would have taken to get all the proper clearances to certify I was compliant in all government areas was overwhelming.

I cannot imagine it being any different for a public institution. The following had their hand in every aspect, and lacking any other benchmark, our fair city used them as such for their own requirements.

NIOSH, OSHA and EPA. Then there were local and state building code requirements specific to the venture.

Some of the more salient requirements were to have a have a certified booth that included the proper CFM of air filtering and exchange. I couldn't touch the $$$ building one, but I found these types of premade booths to be a much better solution:

get the idea.

Most premade booths are just that, booths. You still need to provide the proper gas proof low temp lighting, a spark proof set of fans to prevent explosions, etc. Spark proof plugs and switches are required, as well as chemical/gas resistant coverings on all electrical devices and wiring. Then there is filtering of the air. In a booth you have to have all the air removed, and filtered to a very exacting protocol.

There are different certifications needed on the exhaust systems, and depending on the level of sophistication of your local code enforcement, this could be tricky.

There is a cert for particulates; there is a cert for gas; and there is in some cases a need for an engineered system by a certified engineer in that field.

One of the things that I was faced with was the disposal of old solvents and finishes, as well as old rags, filters, and containers. I would have had to make arrangements with a local "hazardous waste management" company to get rid of that stuff, and provide the local guys with proof I did.

And then there was insurance. I had to provide certificates of compliance in all areas mentioned above before they would consider me. That meant I had to have another group of independent professionals come out and inspect the final set up to make sure it was compliant to the company standards, and that all applicable standards had been met.

I hope you get the idea. This is a really big project once you get past a booth big enough to spray a chair.

With all the legal hoops, the design requirements, the proof of compliance to all govt regulations, and the cost to build... I gave up.

Can you see why no one jumped right in?

Robert