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PAINTSQUARE BLOG CONTRIBUTORS
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Warren Brand |
Warren Brand’s coatings career has ranged from entry-level field painting to the presidency of two successful companies. Over nearly three decades, he has project-managed thousands of coating installations and developed specs for thousands of paint and coating applications. NACE Level 3 and SSPC PCS certified, Brand, an MBA and martial-arts instructor, now heads Chicago Corrosion Group, a leading coatings consultancy. Contact Warren.
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Learning to Serve By Warren Brand |
When I started my corrosion mitigation consulting firm in 2010, I had one fundamental principle in mind: to do exclusively what is in the best interest of our clients, even above our own....
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POSTED SEPTEMBER 25, 2018 | 5 COMMENTS |
Thermoplastics: The Genie is Peeking Out of the Bottle By Warren Brand |
You heard it here first, folks. Paint is dead. It just doesn’t know it yet....
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POSTED JUNE 18, 2018 | 14 COMMENTS |
Understanding MIC (and the H2S Connection) By Warren Brand |
Understanding run-of-the-mill corrosion on steel is complex enough. I remember my confusion when first learning about the interaction between an anode, cathode, metallic pathway and electrolyte....
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POSTED AUGUST 15, 2017 | 9 COMMENTS |
The Questionable Promise of Superhydrophobic Coatings By Warren Brand |
Imagine for a moment painting a surface that never gets dirty. Or one that’s perfectly cleaned whenever it rains or is simply rinsed down with water....
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POSTED MARCH 21, 2017 | 15 COMMENTS |
The World’s Largest Movable Structure You’ve Probably Never Heard About By Warren Brand |
It’s called The New Safe Confinement (NSC). Picture a massive, movable hangar-like dome designed to cover the highly radioactive remains of the nuclear reactor at Chernobyl, Ukraine....
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POSTED DECEMBER 21, 2016 | 4 COMMENTS |
Normalization of Deviance By Warren Brand |
It brought down both Space Shuttles, is responsible for the disaster at Deepwater Horizon and is an insidious issue for many corrosion mitigation failures....
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POSTED NOVEMBER 2, 2016 | 23 COMMENTS |
Outgassing: It’s Not Just Hot Air By Warren Brand |
I am intimately familiar with the fine art of “eye-rolling.” As the followers of my blog know, I have three daughters, ages 16, 19 and 22....
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POSTED AUGUST 31, 2016 | 9 COMMENTS |
Between a Rock and a Rusty Place By Warren Brand |
My eldest daughter, Jessica, 21, excitedly called me a few months ago to tell me about a new hobby she’s taken up: bouldering. If you’re anything like me, you’ve just had the response, “Huh? Is that a...
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POSTED JUNE 29, 2016 | 0 COMMENTS |
Our Industry’s Aversion to Risk: Nothing Is Risk-Free By Warren Brand |
I was 18 and SCUBA diving off a pristine, white, sandy beach in the Red Sea. My dive-buddy was a highly experienced world-traveling...
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POSTED MAY 18, 2016 | 3 COMMENTS |
Are Your Clients Arguing from Ignorance or Authority? By Warren Brand |
For those of you who follow my blog, you’ll know I live with four women—three daughters (15, 19 and 21) and my wife, whose age will remain confidential as I prefer to remain married....
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POSTED APRIL 13, 2016 | 5 COMMENTS |
A Tale of Two Contractors: The Hidden, Staggering Costs of Inefficiency By Warren Brand |
It was early spring of 2007 when my old coating company got the call from Grainger World Headquarters to line the interior of four, identical, stainless steel cooling tower basins....
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POSTED MARCH 9, 2016 | 7 COMMENTS |
Kindness: The Missing Ingredient in Any Successful Coating Application By Warren Brand |
It was 2010 and I had just turned 50 when I walked away from a family business. In doing so, I sacrificed roughly three years of salary. I had tried as best I could to change the culture of our family...
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POSTED JANUARY 27, 2016 | 0 COMMENTS |
A Tale of Two Clients By Warren Brand |
There’s a concept in martial arts that the first time a student sees a...
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POSTED NOVEMBER 18, 2015 | 6 COMMENTS |
Can We Save Our Corroding Infrastructure? By Warren Brand |
It's time for a new way of thinking. Let’s first start with a story from a 60 Minutes exposé that aired...
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POSTED OCTOBER 6, 2015 | 24 COMMENTS |
A Pleasant Surprise in the Permian Basin By Warren Brand |
The three-hour drive through the scrub of the Northwestern Shelf of the Permian Basin was hot, long and fascinating....
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POSTED AUGUST 18, 2015 | 10 COMMENTS |
Specifications: Does Anyone Still Care? By Warren Brand |
When I was nine or 10, my summers were spent with gun-toting workmen, driving around Chicago in old blue Metros, lining the exterior bottoms of 275-gallon tanks in the city’s basements....
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POSTED JUNE 18, 2015 | 6 COMMENTS |
Standards: Guidelines or Gospel? By Warren Brand |
In coatings, as in every other profession, you can go by the book or you can go with what real life demands. Sometimes, those are very different paths....
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POSTED APRIL 6, 2015 | 7 COMMENTS |
Seeking Sense from the Experts By Warren Brand |
It takes an enormous amount to get under my skin. But I just attended a conference for the benefit of Illinois DOT and came away appalled....
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POSTED MARCH 24, 2015 | 15 COMMENTS |
Failure? Analyze This (or Don't) By Warren Brand |
So, I get a call from the manager of a tony high-rise condo on Chicago’s Gold Coast....
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POSTED NOVEMBER 17, 2014 | 10 COMMENTS |
Driving Data from Disco to Digital By Warren Brand |
For nearly 30 years, I’ve watched, fascinated, as technology in the coatings industry has advanced....
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POSTED SEPTEMBER 16, 2014 | 2 COMMENTS |
Lead: Much Ado about Nothing? By Warren Brand |
I can think of few corrosion protective materials more durable, functional and versatile than lead. Setting aside the health issues for a moment, the history of lead is truly remarkable—like the Swiss...
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POSTED JULY 28, 2014 | 12 COMMENTS |
Coating Inspectors: Are We Necessary? By Warren Brand |
Over 30 years in the industry, I’ve been on most sides of many paint issues. I’ve owned a painting company; I’ve represented coatings; and I’m a coating consultant and inspector with an SSPC-PCS, NACE...
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POSTED APRIL 24, 2014 | 23 COMMENTS |
‘Solutions’ That Also Teach Lessons By Warren Brand |
It all started over coffee with a friend. I had wondered to Dean, a coating rep, how it was that Chicago—the U.S.’s third-largest market—had never hosted a local corrosion conference...
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POSTED MARCH 25, 2014 | 0 COMMENTS |
How Much Does a Bad Paint Job Cost? By Warren Brand |
I’m passionate about everything pertaining to our industry. I have one company that consults on technical aspects of coating selection and application, and another that focuses on business development...
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POSTED FEBRUARY 24, 2014 | 2 COMMENTS |
I Try to be Flexible... By Warren Brand |
We are in the process of getting a water tank—85 feet in diameter and roughly 80 feet tall—back in service.From start to finish, we have about four weeks....
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POSTED DECEMBER 3, 2013 | 9 COMMENTS |
The Perils of O-Ring Thinking By Warren Brand |
When it comes to failure, there are causes, and then there are causes....
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POSTED NOVEMBER 5, 2013 | 1 COMMENT |
Beyond the Cold Wall: A Penetrating Look By Warren Brand |
Thanks to everyone for reading, thinking about and commenting on my last blog on the Cold Wall Effect. For better or worse, the column seems to have raised more questions than it answered....
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POSTED SEPTEMBER 20, 2013 | 8 COMMENTS |
The Cold War over the Cold Wall Effect By Warren Brand |
Reality is not always as firm a thing as we would wish, alas, even in the realm of coatings science. Take the Cold Wall Effect: to some experts, a key cause of coating failure; to others, a myth....
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POSTED SEPTEMBER 5, 2013 | 18 COMMENTS |
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