As the oldest baseball park in South Carolina, Duncan Park Stadium in Spartanburg belies its age due to a grassroots effort to completely overhaul the facility’s electrical system, plumbing, locker rooms, concession areas, and overall appearance using high performance coatings from Tnemec.
“This is an historical stadium,” explained Cris Crissinger, the project’s technical consultant with McMillan Pazdan Smith Architecture. “The stadium is open on three sides and approximately 90 percent of the surfaces that were coated are under cover. Ultraviolet (UV) light was a concern on the stadium’s perimeter and columns that were exposed to the sun.”
Crissinger cited Tnemec’s reputation and technical expertise as factors in the coating selection process. Working from samples provided by Tnemec, the architects were able to match the desired color with the durability they required. “The selected color came out perfectly,” Crissinger recalled.
Steel surfaces were high-pressure washed at 4,000 psi and prepared in accordance with SSPC-SP3 Power Tool Cleaning prior to receiving an overcoat of Series 135 Chembuild, a high-build modified polyamidoamine epoxy for marginally prepared rusty steel. The same coating was also used to prevent corrosion of steel underneath the stadium’s grandstand.
A finish coat of Series 73 Endura-Shield, a semi-gloss polyurethane highly resistant to abrasion and exterior weathering, was applied to steel that is shielded from the sun. Perimeter steel exposed to UV light received a finish coat of Series 1071 Fluoronar, a high-solids fluoropolymer coating with outstanding color and gloss retention. The stadium’s overhead deck was power-washed before receiving a spray-applied coat of Series 115 Uni-Bond DF, a hydrophobic acrylic coating in the color white.
The coating contractor on the project was credited by Crissinger for a job well done. “They were a very good group to work with,” he acknowledged. “They were very conscientious. They had modern, up-to-date equipment, very good installers and a quality control group of inspectors who were NACE-certified.”
Constructed in 1926, Duncan Park Stadium hosted textile league baseball for decades and was home to the Spartanburg Phillies minor league baseball team until 1994. A successful effort to revitalize the facility was launched in 2005 by local citizens. And today, the stadium continues to host the local American Legion baseball program, as well as the Spartanburg Stingers, a collegiate team that plays during the summer in the wooden bat Coastal Plain League, and the Spartanburg High School team.