New energy-flexible oven for vehicle paint shops

German engineering firm Dürr has introduced a new oven for automotive paint shops that can run on natural gas, electricity or hydrogen.

The new EcoSmartCure system uses Dürr’s Qflex technology to decouple the oven from a fixed heat source, allowing operators to switch between energy types without structural changes to the oven itself.

At the centre of the technology is a standalone heating module that supplies heat to individual oven zones via a variable heating circuit.

If an operator later wishes to switch the energy source, for example because it is installing its own solar power system, there is no change to the oven and only the heating module is modified.

Dürr said the Qflex technology also makes it easy to integrate innovative technologies such as electric high-temperature storage units to store energy for later use.

The EcoSmartCure is being tested for industrial use, with two customer projects already under way.