Towering above Mt. Vernon, Illinois, with a vivid, intricate wrap-around motif and a tagline that reads, “Creativity Redefined,” a stunning water tank stands as the beginning of reinvention for a proud local community.
Since 2012, The City of Mt. Vernon had been in the midst of rebranding itself and when the opportunity arose to use their new water tank as a community billboard they took full advantage. When coating began, they chose an interior and exterior coatings system from Tnemec.
"The City of Mt. Vernon knew they wanted to adorn the tank with their new brand,” recalled Mike Cerutti of Coating Solutions, LLC. “But they went back and forth on the exact design until they found the perfect one.”
The tank itself was constructed by CB&I and all of the plated steel, for both the interior and exterior, was shop-primed with Tnemec’s aromatic zinc-rich urethane, Series 91-H2O Hydro-Zinc. Once delivered to the jobsite and erected, the interior received two coats of Series N140 Pota-Pox Plus, an ANSI/NSF Std. 61-certified epoxy coating for potable water tanks.
The exterior received an intermediate coat of Series 73 Endura-Shield before the finish coat was applied. The finish coat specified was Series V700 Low VOC HydroFlon – Tnemec’s flagship water tank fluoropolymer coating.
“Series V700 was chosen as the finish coat because of its long-term color and gloss retention and they wanted the tank to look outstanding for years to come,” stated Cerutti. “This product meets area VOC regulations and provides extremely long-term maintenance cycles.”
The design that swirls from the ground to the top of the elevated tank was applied using HydroFlon in several colors. “They submitted colors and we provided them with options in every shade,” said Cerutti. “They ended up using two gallons of seven different colors for the logo and design.”
The resulting tank was among 200 nominations for Tnemec’s Tank of the Year contest. In the first year that Tnemec opened up the vote for the annual tank crown to the public, Mt. Vernon’s tank received 759 votes. After receiving enough votes to make the top twelve final tanks, Tnemec’s panel of water tank experts chose Mt. Vernon as the 2013 Tank of the Year.