What Will Affect Delivery Time of Pre-painted Steel?

Color-coated steel has become one of the main materials for buildings and enclosures. It has some advantageous features, such as rich colors, easy installation, great corrosion resistance, and durability. However, due to the diversity of prepainted steel (for example color, shape, etc.), its delivery time has become one of the problems that plague many users. Below let’s analyze what will influence the delivery time of pre-painted steel.

First of all, let’s review the production process of color-coated steel.

At present, the most widely used production process of color-coated steel is coil coating and baking process, especially the double-coating and double-baking process.

Uncoiling —- Welding —- Degreasing —- Chemical pretreatment —- Primary coating —– Baking —- Cooling —- Finish coating —- Baking —- Cooling —- Quality inspection —- Coiling

As shown in the figure below:

You can check the videos on our Youtube Channel to know the color coating line better. Of course, welcome to visit our factory on-site as well.

The delivery time of pre-painted steel is affected by several factors, including:

1. Production of Substrate

Color-coated sheet is a product formed with base metal and paint. The substrates need to go through multiple production processes such as hot rolling, cold rolling (pickling), galvanizing (galvalume/zinc-aluminum-magnesium coating), etc. After the order is placed, it is necessary to prepare from iron ore smelting, especially for full-process steel mills or purchase base metals.

2. Batch Production of Colors

Each order requires different colors, which means that the paint pool needs to be cleaned (replacing the paint). In order to reduce the switching frequency, steel mills will batch-produce orders with the same color and paint type within a certain period of time. Once the substrate or coating is not in place in time, it will be scheduled for the next production cycle.

3. Process Control

The process control system of color-coated products is particularly important to ensure the quality of color-coated products. Each parameter of the color-coated sheet has a strict tolerance range. If there is an abnormality, both the process parameters and performance results will be confirmed and judged by the quality inspection department.

How to Improve Delivery Efficiency?

1. Substrate preparation

Taking Wanzhi Steel for example, we will prepare some substrates of commonly used specifications in advance, including hot-rolled/cold-rolled/galvanized coils, etc. to improve the delivery efficiency.

2. Green channel for urgent orders

For urgent engineering orders, we will adopt a separate delivery process and give priority to preparing substrates and coatings. However, the green channel can only meet the demand for a small number of orders.

3. Common specifications in stock

We also have some commonly used color-coated steel coils and sheets in stock, for example:

Stock thickness: 0.4/0.45/0.5/0.6/0.8mm;

Stock width: 1,000/1,200mm;

Common colors: sea blue/white gray/silver/iron gray/ivory/bright red, etc.

Wanzhi Tips

Generally, the delivery time of pre-painted steel is 7-30 working days. Expect the factors above, the order quantity will also influence the delivery time. If you have no special requirements on the color and sizes, the stock products will be a good choice. Its delivery period is short and its price will be lower as well. While the urgent order will be more expensive. But if you require special sizes, paintings, and colors, try to place your order in advance to leave enough time for production and shipping. If you have any questions, please feel free to talk with us!