Walther spray gun replacement

You could use the "just in time" delivery method and maintain a very low inventory instead.

Thanks for the feedback bwire. We do use JIT and our spares inventory runs on KanBan system and for a three day lead time for replacement spares from Europe means that we need to hold additional safety stock for our own JITcustomers. (We run the whole factory at around 18 working hours manufacturing inventory.)

That's why I'm looking for interchange components that I can then investigate local (Australian) supply so that we can get 1 day response on spares. (We then investigate cost/benefit of maintaining reduced inventory to the cost of carrying complete spares inventory versus the risk of breakdown.)

Worst case, we have six such spray units in the system and one complete "spare" plus some service components. Next step would be to canabalise one and then run with five.

The units from Walther are not expensive in isolation, just that if there is a local agent for suitable interchange components then we can defer that expense.

to my view three problems appear in your post

1) walther prides itself on unique products for the resolution of day to day issues around spraying materials or caoting compounds whether the problem arises in a lab a home or on a production line, their prodycts are had to beat because of the accuracy they are made with for each type of material being applied. the springs and nozzle sizes have to be matched to the coatings' viscosity index, not doing that results in rapid wear on the solenoid and chamber of the gun.

2) by not having a fully available back up[ system of 2 guns the need to have a sixth ubnit for canabalizing is eliminated

3 the weaknesess inherent in the bean counter inspired / dictated just in time delivery systems are something thatr you could consider drawing attenttion to. the tremendous losses this type of "cost saving" really results in are well documented.

based on experience i say spend the money thay you are paying the bean counter on either arranging a sub dealership withexclusive to your factoryend user sggreement withwalter or put the money into more spray guns either way the products production costs will be reduced, even more important by experience having tools to do a job and not an accontabt telling you that is too expensive will result in greater volume lowered cost to manufacture products.

`da ber

GA.

Incidentally I'm not a proponent of JIT either.

Just a guess, but most fairly precision items like that are not very interchangeable. If they were, the repair aftermarket would be useless to them. You could always look into becoming the Ozzy distributor!

(Following the usual disclaimers, all agents' commissions and finders' fees should be directed to EM/ER Productions, NA ™.)

Thanks all for the feedback. There seems to be no alternatives noted, so our plan of action from here is to maintain contact and obtain component supply through Walther directly and maintain no increase in inventory of spares.

We have however located another user of this brand of spray equipment in Australia (only 200 km away) and through a regional partnership/benchmarking group that we are both participants in have agreed to share spares if there is an urgent breakdown.

There is also an equipment supplier in Aus that stocks some parts, but at 800% of the FOB price from Europe, it's unlikely that they will get many orders for parts.

We could have changed to another brand of guns that we use elsewhere in the plant for paint, but have chosen to maintain the machine in "as manufactured" situation. As has been said, the Walther brand are good guns for the intended application and thus we have no need to change over.

I'll close my participation in this thread at this point unless someone prods me from the side.