PC Powder availability in Europe?

[Pebbles]

Hello everyone,

I'm new to powder coating and I'm looking to start, but the problem is I live in Belgium/Europe and I try to avoid excessive shipping and custom's costs, which I would face if I would buy powders like Harbor Freight Red or if I would import already expensive speciality powder like High-Tek.

I believe the real thing is already available as a generic low cost industrial powder, but I have no clue where to start.

Anyone can recommend me a working powder that's available in Europe? My own input woud be to try some epoxy powder from http://pulvertech.de/

However, in theory, powder coating can be: "polyester, polyurethane, polyester-epoxy (known as hybrid), straight epoxy (fusion bonded epoxy) and acrylics” (Wikipedia).

I looked at HF red but the label gives no clue as to the chemical composition, and the powders that are listed in the "definitive list : what powders work ..." thread are an US proposition if I looked correctly.

What I want is the following:
- shake and bake method (fast, easy and repeatable) using plastic tub or tumbler with BB's
- I want to avoid to individually manipulate the boolits, I just want to dump them in a single layer on the non stick aluminium in my oven without the bullets to stick together;

By the way I'm inspired by: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=nRqKGBpqVjc

My aim is to produce my own supply of bullets for sports shooting in revolver, pistol and rifle in different calibers. I want to avoid waisting my guns and time by a wrong powder selection, and making a good choice, especially if the knowledge can already be shared over here. I intend to size after coating and eventually apply gas checks for Rifle.

Thanks in advance for your advice. If this was covered elsewhere on the forum, then my apologies, I must have overlooked it and please direct me to the spot.

[Retumbo]

"Wiederladertv" see if you can contact him

http://www.wiederlader.tv/

E-Mail: anfrage@wiederlader.tv

[Eddie17]

I would look for a powder coating company in your area. A lot of metal fab shops outsource there products to be powder coated, where ever they are located.
Your link is in a language I do not understand. Do some resurch, possibly get some leads on shops that my have excess powder, that they will let go cheap. Experiment!
Best of luck!
Ed

[Retumbo]

You should also check at local fishing stores. They use powder to coat fishing weights and jig heads

[edp2k]

If you check with the user "smoke4320" I believe he and others have said that the PC powders that they use/sell are
polyester based. Also check his threads and he mentions the brand name of the powders he uses,
it may be available in Europe.

[Grmps]

Try googling it, I did find several places but can't understand most of what I read.

I would look for a high gloss polyester powder coat, they seem to work the best.

Cheers

[xrayfk05]

First I tried some local powder (https://www.coating4all.com/) but it did not coat very well using any of the shake/tumbler methods.
Added airsoft BBs and some styrofoam but no go.
After that I just bought 3 pounds + some BBs from Smoke, total cost was 70 euro.

You use so little powder, powder cost is probably insignificant no matter if you pay 20 euro or 70 euro per 1,5 LBs.
Add to that that if you buy the wrong powder once, Smoke's powder may even be cheaper in the long run.
Also, Smoke's powder is really great, coating bullets takes no effort whatsoever.

But, if you do manage to find a cheap source of good powder somewhere in Europe I would like to hear where :)

[popper]

IIRC you can only get a certain 'type' in EU, TFIG. Check with your local paint manuf. for non-architectural powder. Their distributors may be able to tell you which distributors sell to the PC shops - unless you want 55gal drums of PC.

[Pebbles]

Hi Everyone,

I'm positively surprised with all the answers and suggestions, thanks a lot. There isn't yet a real solution but I am happy to find helpful people.

I can already give you some feedback on some suggestions:
- Wiederladertv: Markus has answered my email, stating that his liquid coating doesn't stick too much if you cure correctly and shake hard after baking;
-RAL colors: RAL is a color sheme that we use a lot in Europe to define what color a paint must be. See for a more clear explanation: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAL_colour_standard
It can be that vendors use a RAL number as article reference, but it doesn't tell what material is carrying the color.

The options that I think I should try out are:
Asking fishing stores, powder manufacturers, checking out Smokes's offering and importing it anyway.

I regard the hint about "high gloss polyester" as really helpful, I will mention it when I approach local vendors/suppliers.

If I eventually end up finding a useful shake-and-bake PC powder, I will definitely post the results over here.

Thanks again

[popper]

Thermoset. Uk

[Shoot66]

Hi,
I´m coming late to the party... I watched the WiederladerTV contributions on the Youtube and kept the Pulvertech as a contingency should I fail with local products.
For tumbling I tried a couple of local RAL products based on polyester-epoxy (got that clue from the ARES Bullets). The results were acceptable, however not spectacular. One coat was enough to prevent leading but, visually... unappealing? Two coatings coverd boolits properly though. Too much hassle for me and I returned to 45/45/10.
Then I decided to order Randy´s dark gray. That was like a day and night. 20 secs of swirling provided a full coating which turned into a pretty smooth and glossy coat in the oven. That´s what I call impressive. :grin:
My two cents.

[xrayfk05]

Where did you order that powder?

[Shoot66]

Here. Contact Randyrat.

[JonB1]

Ukraine on ebay (https://www.ebay.com.au/usr/zhserg17?_trksid=p2057872.m2749.l2754)

I've got some gloss black & red and some fluoro orange on the way.

[Pebbles]

Hi JonB1,

Did the Ukraine Ebay powders work out well for shake&bake? Or do you need to use anther process? Thanks for letting me know some more details.

Kind regards,
Mr. Pebbles

[Pebbles]

Thanks to everyone over here for all the reactions.

I did not yet buy any powder, but I thought it would be nice from my side to give a kind of ‘status quo’:

- It looks as if the one of the magic ingredients that do guarantee the shake-and-bake method, is an adhesive product called TGIC. It seems to be a forbidden ingredient over here in Europe. It would also be safe to assume that this is done because this powder is highly toxic and may cause cancer like diseases. Not sure in what measure it is forbidden, but I see no manufacturers that compose PC powders with this magic ingredients.

Anyway this advocates the use of pretective gear like dust mask, goggles, gloves and good higiene habits;

- Markus from WiederladerTv told me he would try another brand of PC powder That I spotted in a German webshop, but this may take more time and other persons who tried polyester of epoxy based powders in europe did not report success;
- My plan is to order powders that have proven to work well, and will import powders like those of Smoke or the other offering on this forum.

Many assumptions and hypotheses here above, but I think this would be my best bet with what I know of today.

I’m curious what powder works best for high velocity rifle, like 30-06 or 223, both with gas check. (Purpose is target shooting at 100m).

Anyway I’ll start with normal pistol and revolver calibers without gaschecks at normal velocities.

Kind regards,
Mr. Pebbles