OK , I'll let one go I was working on last year and said I came up with something , worked with it for a season and it worked out fantastic for me..I'm sure others in this position will benefit from this tip....you might not appreciate this one though if you live in the sunshine states so you'll have to use your imagination of what some of us other tinters that work in snow conditions have to put up with waiting for a car to thaw out and the mess it leaves in your shop with water run off once it thaws.
I've shared this with 2 other tinter friends of mine up in Canada that does mobile tinting and doesnt always have a draining system in the shop he works at and LOVES THIS TIP.
This tip is for the tinter in this environment that tints in a shop that doesn't have a draining system (I felt is necessary to repeat myself on that
):
1.You go to your local super pet store and purchase 50mm thick pond liner(rubber) that is used for outdoor fish ponds and buy a sheet that is 20 ft. x 10 ft (approx) .
2. Position it down on the shop floor
3. Flip each side up 1ft inwards onto itself so the dimensions are now approx 18ft x 8ft (all sides are now slightly raised off the ground like a large shallow basin rather than a flat sheet of rubber)
4. drive your iced up vehicle onto the center of the mat , as the car starts to thaw, the water usually wants to run in a specific direction unless your garage floor is PERFECTLY level which is unlikely.
5. instead of mopping it up, have your shop wet vac handy and just suck up the collecting pool of thawed water that collected at one of the 4 raised corners of the containing mat.
This keeps the rest of the shop clean , the mat withstands constant vehicles traveling on it without puncturing the mat , the mat cleans up real nice whenever you want and removable by folding it away in 2 minutes after snow season to be used the following year
This is the best pic I have hopefully you get the idea with it ..the ends of the mat are raised enough in height that the run off of water collects and stops dead in its tracks b4 running and hitting the drywall or anything of value , turn on the shopvac a few times for a couple of seconds and voila, no mopping .
A tip for small shop/mobile winter tinters
Jan 15 2007, 08:02 AM
