Introduction to Motor City Aftermarket’s SaltShieldTM Coating System

Nothing worse than picking out the perfect bumper, going through the process of installation, then a year later (or less) dealing with unsightly rust. Over time your steel components will take on battle wounds, scratches, and dents. That shouldn’t mean it’s showtime for rust.

The biggest culprit to a rusty bumper is “rust creep”. Rust creep starts in the crevice of a weld, a small scratch from a tree limb, rocks, or even an invisible thumb print that wasn’t properly cleaned during the powder coating process. Add road salt to the mix and you have a recipe for rust creep.

Motor City Aftermarket’s in-house SaltShieldTM coating system stops rust creep dead in its tracks. We spent almost a year testing and perfecting the multi-step process that outperforms the military specification for rust creep by 2X. It takes longer than your typical powder coat process but ensures a longer life for your powder coated components.

Kristen Rolfe from Global Finishes Group describes the testing procedure performed and the results as of July 20, 2018.

So how do we apply coating to withstand over 1,750 hours of salt spray testing?

Inhibiting Rust
First, the product is shot blasted. We wait no longer than 24 hours to move to the next step to ensure that no airborne particles land on the product. We maintain an extremely clean environment.

Next, we soak the product in a liquid, military-grade rust inhibitor for an optimal period of time. We specifically chose the ingredients and length of soak based on salt spray testing performance.

Coatings
The rust inhibitors themselves are more than enough, however, to promote an elite, rustless product we apply a cured, gel primer. The primer locks out the elements.

Before receiving the final coat, the primer is then “half baked”. The final black, textured powder coat is applied and fully baked or “cured”.

Details and Quality
All of the products that contain threads are plugged in order to keep them clean, then re-tapped for a perfect fit.

The coating is then mil checked for the appropriate powder distribution and thickness.

Motor City Aftermarket parts coated with the SaltShieldTM coating system come with a 5-year coating warranty and lifetime structural.