FARMINGTON, N.M. (Sept. 30, 2003) – With help from a NASA-funded outreach program, local business owners Dave and Shane Davis are creating products that could revolutionize the disposal of wastewater from painting projects.
     The Davis brothers are developing products that address the problem of wastewater used to wash paintbrushes, rollers and paint sprayers and turned to the Space Alliance Technology Outreach Program (SATOP) for technical assistance.
“Everywhere there’s a paint project, there’s a paint mess, especially in new construction. And I’ve seen too much wastewater poured onto the ground or down drains,” Dave Davis said. “Professional painters do it and do-it-yourselfers do it. There has to be a better and more environmentally sensitive way.”
     After 15 years in the commercial paint business, the Davises believe they have a better way. Dave, the president and CEO of Quicktruss, Inc. in Farmington and his brother Shane, founded the company in 1996 to create innovative, timesaving painting tools for professional painters. The brothers constantly are looking for ways to improve the painting process and they have turned their attention to solving the wastewater problem with a unique concept conceived by Shane.
     “The goal of our product would be to take the dirty paint water from paintbrushes, rollers or sprayers and put it through a filtration system that would filter out the paint and leave the water clean enough to pour out on the ground,” Dave Davis said.
     He has developed two different products, one for professional painters and one for do-it-yourselfers. The professional version will attach a filtration device to the paint spray gun to filter the wastewater as it is sprayed out at the end of the day. The home version would place the filter at the bottom of a bucket so that paint particles would be trapped as the wastewater is released through the bottom of the container.
     While Davis had a clear idea of what his products would do, he needed help determining the best type of filtration to filter paint from wastewater. “We know a lot about paint, but not as much about filtration,” he said. “We had a water treatment company help us at first, but still couldn’t get quite where we needed to be.”
Davis then heard about the Space Alliance Technology Outreach Program (SATOP) while working with Sandia National Laboratories in Albuquerque. SATOP provides free engineering assistance to small businesses with technical challenges through the donations of time and expertise from 44 Alliance Partners. Because Davis’ request for technical assistance (RTA) required very specific expertise in filtration, SATOP put Davis in contact with an expert in the field – Professor Amad Tayebi at the University of Massachusetts at Lowell. Professor Tayebi recommended a depth filter as the most effective in separating the waste stream products. He also made design recommendations and referred Davis to one of the largest filter manufacturers in the world, American Felt & Filter in New Windsor, N.Y.
     Davis now is working with American Felt & Filter on both versions of the product and plans to be in production within the next year.
     “Without SATOP, we still wouldn’t have a clue if we should pursue this project or not,” he said. “Now we have a production goal in sight for a product that will be unique in the marketplace and will help our company grow.”