WoodDigest.com |

As an industry consultant and training professional, I visit over 50 wood manufacturers each year. They range from one-man shops to multimillion dollar operations. In both large and small finishing facilities, I am always amazed at how few shops have an effective employee training program. Less than 10 percent of all wood manufacturers regularly train their finishing department. Finishing is a highly skilled art and a complex science. Most manufacturers will agree that finishing is the most difficult phase of their manufacturing process. It is also recognized that the finish is the most important process in wood manufacturing and generating bottom-line profits and provide customer satisfaction.

There are several basic topics or categories of finisher training that are necessary to provide a comprehensive training program.

To develop an accurate comprehensive training program, a standard operating procedure (SOP) may be used for the outline. If you do not have SOPs, it will first be necessary to develop detailed, written procedures. There are several SOP software program templates available for purchase, or you may call AWFI for a source of SOP template setup for finishing operations.

The template software should be simple to follow, easy to use and allow digital photos to be inserted into the SOP document. An SOP is not an essay. It is concise step-by-step instructions of the procedure. Care must be taken when writing it to include all critical information about the process. SOPs should also follow best practice standards. Writing standard operating procedures provides focus onto the procedure and may allow opportunity to upgrade the process to best practice standards.

Whitewood sanding and surface preparation
The whitewood sanding procedure training plan may include the following:

• Lists of approved sanding equipment
• Setup of sanding equipment
• Air supply requirements / CFM
• Approved abrasive materials
• List of products that will receive surface preparation procedure
• Techniques used in the sanding procedure
• Sequence of steps used in the process
• Handling and stacking of the materials
• Pre process and post process equipment checks and maintenance
• Abrasive material replacement intervals

Any detailed instructions, hard samples and photos of substrate and sanding techniques are always useful for this training program.

Stain/glazing/color development
Staining and glazing procedures are very technique driven. A well balanced training program for these procedures not only includes instructions from the SOPs, but also includes extensive hands-on training, visual aids such as step panels and go and no go panels. Some of the elements to include in the color development training program are:

• Lists of approved stain and glaze materials
• Approved application equipment — rags, brushes and spray guns
• Setup parameters of the equipment
• Approved application techniques for the process
• Dry times
• Process sequences
• Handling and racking of materials
• Mixing the coating
• Equipment checks and cleanup
• Waste and rag removal and disposal
• How to compare color to the color standard

This comprises the basic training outline for color development, but it may not be all inclusive of your finishing process requirements.