Automotive Coating and Its “Very Important Sidekicks”

Monday, May 7 2018

ALPS Coating is a prominent manufacturer of coating products. We develop, manufacture and market a wide portfolio of high performance automotive refinish and industrial paint. Not many people in the market knows what coating are and what purpose do they serve. In simple terms, we produce “cosmetic” to beautify the products and at the same time, making them more durable, tough and long lasting.

Here, we are introducing the “Very Important Sidekicks” in the automotive coating; Putty, Primer, Basecoat, Topcoat, Clearcoat & Thinner (Yes, we know that the terminology alone might be confusing, but we will try our very best to explain it in the simplest way).

Putty is basically a soft, mouldable greyish-yellow paste that hardens after a few hours. We usually use Putty to bridge and fill in the gap on dented and uneven surface.
Tips – a good putty must be easy to apply, easy to sand, have good adhesion on many surface and excellent filling properties.

Next in line is Primer, also known as undercoat is a preparatory coating put on automobile before colour painting. Do we really need to have priming? The answer is Yes, of course! Priming ensures better adhesion of paint to the surface and at the same time, increase paint durability and provides additional protection for the automobile. A good primer must be good adhesion, corrosion resistance, excellent filling and opacity.

After primer coat, we will be applying Basecoat. Basecoat contains the visual properties of colour and effect. Commonly refer to as the paint. Basecoat in automotive is divided into three categories: solid (no sparkle effect), metallic (with sparkling effect), and pearlescent (contains special pigments commonly referred to as “pearls” and with coloured sparkle effect).

Many people might confuse between a Basecoat and a Topcoat, thinking that both are the same. Basically, a Topcoat is to apply either after the Basecoat or after Primer, in order to maintain its strength (such as weather-resistance) and appearance (such as mirror-like effect, glossy or matte. Topcoat can be solid colour or transparent (Clearcoat).

Clearcoat is a type of Topcoat which MUST be used over the colour Basecoat. A good Clearcoat must be durable enough to resist abrasion and chemically stable to withstand UV light. It can be either solvent or water borne.

As for Thinner, it is used to thin the paint in order to make the paint flow better so the end result is even. You may select a fast, medium or slow drying Thinner depending on type of paint you used and also the weather/ temperature during drying.

To find out more on the product variants, you may visit us at https://www.alpscoating.com/en/automotive-refinish/ .