Workshops come off solvent for three honest reasons: an occupied site, a VOC conversation with a client, or staff who are done with the smell. The mistake is dropping one waterborne tin into a solvent process and hoping the doors come out the same.
Sample the new system on the old job
Bring a door or a panel that already exists in solvent. We will match the colour on the waterborne base you will spray — Sirca interior or Novalk low-VOC — at the sheen the client already signed. Spray a full system sample: sealer or self-sealer, then topcoat. Compare under the same lights you use for sign-off.
Sheen will not automatically translate. A 10% solvent matt and a 10% waterborne matt can read differently on the same oak. That is a sample conversation, not a complaint after 40 doors.
The booth has to be set for water
Waterborne films are less forgiving of dirty air, silicone and leftover solvent in the line.
- Dedicated pots, cups and guns, or a wash-up so thorough that no gun-wash residue remains
- Use the waterbase gun wash we stock, not the solvent wash “because it is there”
- Watch humidity and temperature. Waterborne needs a room that can dry, not a cold unit with the door open to a wet yard
- Build coats to the data sheet. Recoat windows are real. Rushing a second coat marks the first
Water based products in the catalogue include self-sealers and stain bases. Ask which stack we would run on your substrate before you buy a sealer from one family and a topcoat from another.
Colour lives on the Corob line the same way
We colour match Sirca waterborne on the spectrophotometer and mix on the Corob dispenser in Tullamore — the same workflow as solvent pigmented systems. Tell us it is waterborne on the order. A formula stored against a solvent AC colour is not the waterborne formula.
When not to switch
High chemical-resistance furniture, some metal work, and jobs that must stay on a certified fire retardant solvent system are not automatic conversions. If the specification names a chemistry, honour it. If the specification names a VOC target, we will place you on the waterborne line that can still hold the sheen.
How we usually start an account on waterborne
One product line, one booth, one week of samples. Then a production run with us on the phone if the first hour looks wrong. Next day delivery still applies. The learning sits in the booth, not on the docket.