As timber windows continue to regain market share from uPVC, the alliance between joinery and coatings companies grows stronger and stronger. In fact, it’s reached the point where, like Morecambe and Wise, you probably couldn’t have one without the other.

A case in point is Wright Joinery in Hull. The company has been supplying the prefinished window market for the past three years but has seen major changes this year following a management buyout in the summer and subsequent investment in new machinery.

“The factory needed a considerable amount of investment to make it competitive, which is why we went for the management buyout,” said managing director Mark Eggleston. “We have invested in new CAD technology, CNC routers and window lines, as well as Quickset moulders which enable us to produce the highest quality products.

“We anticipated the increasing demand for pre-finished timber windows from both the private and public sectors and armed ourselves with the equipment to provide maximum capacity to meet customers’ demands.”

That included switching to Sikkens paint coatings during the past three months. “The main driver for that was the maintenance programme that Sikkens offers,” said Mr Eggleston. “We’re trying to raise the game and offer better product to market and specifiers ears really prick up when they hear we are partners in the Sikkens Sentinel Plus Wood Protection programme.”

Partnering initiative

Sentinel Plus is a partnering initiative offered free of charge to professional users and specifiers of Akzo Nobel‘s Sikkens woodcare range and aims to raise the standard of timber joinery and improve its long-term performance. Adopting a total systems approach, the programme enables a team of technical consultants to work closely with joinery manufacturers at the time of specification.

The site is analysed prior to specification and this information is incorporated into a database which subsequently enables the tracking of the maintenance cycle for the finished joinery timbers. Technical consultants also monitor the project and advise on the maintenance required and the appropriate coatings. The recommendations correspond to the maintenance requirements of a one-coat redecoration.

The Sentinel Plus programme is a long-term solution which requires all elements of the supply chain to work together. The benefit for the joinery manufacturer is that the partnership allows it to offer a much broader service to the client and raise its role from supplier to service provider.

Concern for the environment was another key reason for Wright Joinery’s switch to Sikkens. The company already uses FSC-certified softwood wherever possible and is moving increasingly to finger-jointed laminate. It also operates its own VacVac impregnation timber treatment plant which applies Arch Timber Protection‘s water-based Vacsol Aqua preservative to the machined components. This provides a 30-year service life against timber degradation.

Reduced drying times

The Sikkens Cetol and Rubbol coatings are also water based, offering significant reductions in emissions of volatile organic compounds and reduced drying times. They are also available in a broad palette of colours.

Part of Wright’s investment was a 50m spraying line, designed and built specifically for the company in consultation with Sikkens’ technical advisers. The spray booth can accommodate a maximum length of 4m and a height of 2.2m thus catering for sizable windows and doors.

Travelling at around 0.3m/min and automatically turning the units through 360O, enabling the operatives to coat all sides, the whole process – one primer, followed by denibbing, followed by two top coats at 170 microns wet film thickness – takes about an hour.

“It’s a very easy product to use,” said Mark Eggleston “With Sikkens’ assistance, the sprayers are well trained and a great deal of attention is paid to issues such as paint thickness, spray gun nozzle size, paint wastage and so on.

“A driving factor for the change to Sikkens is the perceived environmental and cost impact of what we produce,” he continued. “Timber is initially more expensive [than uPVC] for the specifier, but Sikkens has done a lot of work on life cycle assessment and life cost cycle which suggests the reverse is true.”