Fletcher Jones in Newport Beach is California’s premier Mercedes Benz dealership. Their collision center is no different in terms of annual sales. When South Coast AQMD came to their shop, the owners knew they would have to upgrade their spray booth heaters to meet the Rule 1147 LoNox burner requirements. This would prove to be a challenge due to the volume of work going through that shop at any given time. Adding to the set of hurdles, with the expansion of the dealership to include the Sprinter Vans, they also needed to add a new Garmat 3000 Hi-Roof spray booth to handle the taller vehicles. FJ Mercedes Benz decided to contact Rely-On Technologies with these unique sets of challenges.
The first challenge was to fit a taller spray booth into what essentially is a parking structure with enough height to handle a van with a height measuring up to 108”. The second challenge was to retro-fit the existing two downdraft booths with brand new Garmat AQMD Pre-Approved burners without slowing down production. With proper pre-planning, Rely-On was up to the challenge to install the new booth with new burners—and keep the collision center at Fletcher Jones producing their high volume of output.
The Garmat 3000 Hi-Roof Sprinter Van booth is a ”modified” downdraft paint booth with a pit-less design. This unit comes with an AQMD Pre-Approved LoNox burner built into the ceiling of the booth and maximizes the valuable floor space Fletcher Jones required to maintain output. Features of this booth were Garmat’s TrueWhite light fixtures, drive through option, and integrated blower system for waterborne paints—a complete package in a smaller footprint. With the booth installed and fired-up, phase two of this project could begin.
With a fully functional spray booth, Rely-On Technologies dismantled the existing booths for the LoNox retrofit. The new Garmat 3000 Burner unit comes complete with the latest Garmat technologies, including a smaller footprint, capacitive touch screen technology and most importantly, is SC AQMD Rule 1147 Pre-Approved. By being pre-approved, there is no need for field testing or additional expense. The booths were retro fitted over two long weekends, and with the input from the head painter Paul, the booths were fired-up, balanced and brought up to “new booth” performance, extending the life of the booth for another twenty years minimum!
With a project of this scope, Rely-On Technologies completed another successful installation of a high performance shop, Fletcher Jones Mercedes, on time and as un-obtrusive to their monthly performance as possible. Having installed the latest Garmat technologies, ensuring that Fletcher Jones will continue as the collision leader for years to come.