At SEMA 2018, Global Finishing Solutions (GFS) sat down with Dave Kindig of Kindig-It Design to discuss his journey of becoming a world-renowned superior craftsman of custom cars. With two GFS Ultra XD Paint Booths, an Ultra XD Paint Mix Room and a custom, 36-by-24-foot triple-bay Ultra XD CTOF Booth, Kindig and his team count on GFS paint booths and finishing equipment to achieve their flawless paint finishes.
What took you from being just a restoration shop to one of the best premiere shops in the world?
You dream about doing something, you find the people that could possibly pull it off, and then you have the equipment that makes it much more possible — it’s pretty easy at that point. I think that’s what really helped us, over the last 20 years in business, continue to grow and be able to pull off the impossible.
Why did you decide to purchase new equipment?
After I was able to buy our building, it was one of those things that I always wanted to do — and of course, everything kept coming back to GFS. The cleanliness, the inside panels, the heating elements. Just the Air Make-Up Unit is so much more advanced than anyone else’s. We kept doing our research, and it always kept coming back to GFS.
What are your favorite features of your GFS equipment?
Being able to set certain cure times for different materials that we’re spraying — that makes it very easy. The control panel is very simple. It’s kind of a no-brainer — you go up, and you want to do a flash. It’s very easy — it goes, does it, and ramps up very quickly. It works very efficient. You’re saving time, you’re on to the next project, and it’s clean.
As busy as we are, we have the second downdraft paint booth, and built off of that is the prep deck. No pillars in there, which gives us the ability to optimize as much of that space that we can. It was a no brainer. Once it was in, it was so cool to keep the dust down in the shop, because we have multiple cars being worked on at a time. Being able to use both of our paint booths at the same time, it worked out really good. It made it a lot more efficient.
How has your GFS equipment impacted your business?
We want to make sure we don’t look like a shop that just takes stuff out of a box and slaps it on a car. We want to make it individual and unique to each of those vehicles. By having the right equipment, enough space to do it, and the right people to do it, that definitely has been the biggest impact — being able to optimize.
Kindig-It’s cars, equipment and team can be seen in episodes of the Motor Trend Network’s “Bitchin’ Rides” and at their custom car fabrication shop in Salt Lake City, Utah.