Sherwin-Williams has upgraded its colour retrieval system with the launch of Color Access 5.6.  This new software gives repairers access to 100,000 colour formulations, including its latest AWX Performance Plus and HP Process paint technologies, enabling them to match colour variations quickly and effectively.

Color Access 5.6 features a new advanced search facility which provides easy identification graphics for Sherwin-Williams’ innovative waterborne and air-dry paint lines as well as availability of the latest Ford EU update.

The AWX Performance Plus waterborne basecoat provides repairers with a compliant refinish paint system that has more advanced blending and colour matching properties, faster flash and drying times, and easy application to produce more consistent coverage for less work.  The latest product formulation also has superior lay down, flashes off even faster, and can be sanded as soon as it has flashed to a matt finish.  It requires fewer coats to achieve better opacity.  Drying takes just three to five minutes with a Venturi.  This makes AWX Performance Plus ideal for large volume bodyshops specialising in high quality car refinish repair, while Color Access 5.6 supplies all the required colour intelligence.

The HP Process with its revolutionary air-dry technology from Sherwin-Williams incorporates clear coats, basecoats, urethane coatings and primers, allowing bodyshops to turn off the heat in the spray booth, reducing energy requirements by up to 80% and eliminating the need for high temperature bake cycles to achieve a fast cure times.  The process cures at ambient 20-25°C room temperatures in less than an hour, depending on the colour and size of job.  This offers a number of  bodyshops benefits such as increasing productivity by as much as 50 per cent, enabling quicker applications between coats, and dramatically reducing the carbon footprint.