Do you paint your kitchen cabinets regularly? Keeping our kitchen cabinets up to date is ready important. It uplifts the status of one of the most important parts of the house. To have a good household, you need a good kitchen that boosts your house.
There are many kitchen cabinets out there. You can use any of them for your kitchen. However, to keep your kitchen space interesting, it is best to change them after a while. Changing the entire cabinet is not always easy. One easy step to modify the appearance of your kitchen is to use painted cabinets.
It is because of this many house makers decide to use a painted cabinet instead of other types of cabinet. In any case, sometimes even if you choose to use a painted cabinet it is not good enough for your kitchen.
This is because not all cabinets are processed right before painting them. In order to pick the right cabinet, you need to know what process the cabinet goes through before painting the cabinet.
Process of preparing cabinets
The panels with which kitchen cabinets are made need to undergo several processes before they are ready for making the cabinet. It is because of painted cabinets. Sometimes when cabinets are painted the color is not properly accepted by the cabinet panels. If that is the case then the cabinets do not appear attractive. So, the process is important or else it can ruin your kitchen atmosphere completely.
Step 1 Machine grinding
The cabinet panel passes through rough grinding machines. There are three machines for this process. Here the panels are polished a few times.
When the panels are placed, they need to be placed lengthwise. Each board passes through from one machine to another automatically. Inside the machine the grinding process takes place.
The process is important because it makes the panel more accepting of paint. The surface can absorb the paint better hence give off a charming outer layer after painting.
In the third machine, fine grinding is done to the panel. After the machine grinding, manual grinding by hand will be done to make sure that the panels are prepared well.
The machines are long just like the longboards for the cabinet; it makes it easier to process them faster and altogether rather than processing them bits by bits.
Even though processing with hand produces a better result, the length of the boards is problems. It is difficult to handle such longboard empty-handed.
If the processing is done by hand, the grinding of the board becomes uneven. Meaning some parts of the panel would absorb the paint better than the rest.
We don’t want that for our kitchen cabinets. That way after painting the panels will not look appealing. Hence hand grinding is avoided in the first steps. So, the grinding process is done in the machine rather than by hand.
Step 2 Using primer sprays
In this step that panel’s outer layers are covered with primer sprays. Once again it makes it more likely to absorb paint and appear nice when the painting is done to the cabinets.
This step needs to be done carefully. The panels need to have primer sprayed on it uniformly. If not it could affect the fine appearance of the cabinets.
To make sure the primer is sprayed equally spraying is started from one corner following the length of the panel to the other end. As the primer is sprayed from one end to the other the worker tries to apply the liquid uniformly coming to the other corner of the board.
Then the spraying is done perpendicularly from the previous direction. Covering all the edges of the cabinet panel. Once this step is complete, the primer is allowed to sit.
For even distribution of the primer, another layer is applied again is 20 minutes to makes sure the panels it properly covered with the primer layer.
Step 3 Repeat machine grinding
After the primer layers are sprayer on the board its time for rough grinding again. This time the panels and taken and polished in the machine.
The process is automatic, but sometimes workers can help manually in the grinding process. It makes sure that the panel can easily take in the paint.
The first step is repeated, sometimes with manual help in the polishing. After each panel is polished, they are ready for the next process.
Step 4 Manual grinding
Now that the machines have done most of the rough grinding, it is time that manual hand grinding is done to the panels. Manual hand grinding produces a much better result than the machine grinding.
Since the board already went through grinding processes several times, there is no chance of uneven grinding now. So, it is safe to do a final grinding by the hand. It makes sure that the paint will be distributed evenly across the cabinet panel.
Mainly this is done to make sure all the parts of the panels grind well. In the machine when the boards are placed for automatical grinding there are chances that the corners of the panels are missed.
Since the machines cover the surface of the piece. It cannot reach the thickness of the board. These are the parts that can be done well by the hands of the worker. In a way, it is the finishing step of the grinding process.
When manual grinding is done, the edge of the panels is polished to make them smooth. The machines focus mainly on grinding the body of the panel rather than the corners.
While manual grinding the worker can judge from their experience if the panels are polished properly. Here they can complete the polishing of the panels themselves and prepare it for the next step.
After the automatic and manual grinding is done, it leaves a lot of dust particles on the surface of the board. They need to be cleaned. Here the worker uses brushes and vacuum to clean the panels again.
Cleaning the panels is a very important step. Since the next step is painting the panels. If the dust is not cleaned properly, then the paint will not reach the surface of the panel. Nor will it get absorbed by the panel which means all the work will go to waste.
So, the worker takes their time to finish this step properly, and take them to the painting area.
Step 5 Surface painting
Once the panels have passed through all the processes above it is ready for surface painting. The spraying technique is similar to the primer spraying technique.
At first, the board is placed on a holder. This holder can be rotated while painting so that the painting can be easily spread throughout the board. As it was with the primer application, the painting is done lengthwise with the help of a spray.
The board is rotated from frequently to cover the corners. Since the paint needs to be sprayed evenly across the panel the process is pretty much similar.
When the painting is done, the panel is taken to the next step of the process, which is baking.
Step 6 Baking the panels
After the panels are painted they are taken into the baking room. Here the panels are baked before packing. They are divided into different sections since each panel will be used for a separate part of the cabinets they need a distinct treatment.
For this, they are baked at different temperatures. Some panels need to dry and do not need baking. They are also brought here to dry up the paint.
From here the panels are separated and taken for the last step of processing before they are packed and taken for shipping.
Step 7 Inspection
Since each process of preparing the panels for cabinets is vital, just before the final step the panels go through checking. In this step, each panel is checked.
Here the workers find out if any panel has defects or not painted properly. If so then that panel cannot be taken for packaging. The smoothness of the boards and color distributions are all checked thoroughly.
All the pieces need to be intact to pass this stage. Once all the panels pass this step, they are taken to the for packaging.
Step 8 Packing and shipping
Only the intact pieces are packed for shipping. For this, they need to be careful so that the pieces don’t get damaged while packing.
They also need to make sure that the package is sturdy. Since traveling can also harm the panel which went through so many steps to reach its destination.
When packed properly all the panels are shipped for the construction of kitchen cabinets.
Final words
As you can see the kitchen cabinet panels go through a number of steps before they can reach your kitchen. There is a lot of hard work to make sure that your cabinets go through the best processing methods.
The kitchen cabinet manufacturers work hard to makes sure you get the cabinet of your dreams. So that your cabinets are long-lasting so your money doesn’t go to waste. In any case, you may still check the products you want to buy from the manufacturer before you pay for them.
