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The downward path to industrial growth?
FOCUS ON P O W D E R C O AT I N G S A MONTHLY REPORT FROM SID HARRIS
THE DOWNWARD PATH TO INDUSTRIAL GROWTH?
APRIL 2012 In this issue
TECHNICAL
2
Photopolymerization of UV powder coatings
INDUSTRY NEWS
2-5
AkzoNobel merger approved AkzoNobel expands in Asia DuPont seeking buyer for automotive coatings business Cytec announces price increase for powder coating resins in The Americas
NEW PRODUCTS
5-6
Nihon Seiko to market two new antimony compounds Hiroichi Kagaku Kogyo to offer cold spray coating process Valspar patents dispersion-coated powder colouring system
MARKETS
6-8
Government urged to encourage large-scale titanium dioxide projects in India Chemical earnings resist slowdown Dow Chemical 4Q and FY 2011: Coatings and Infrastructure Solutions results
EVENTS
AN INTERNATIONAL NEWSLETTER MONITORING TECHNICAL AND COMMERCIAL DEVELOPMENTS IN POWDER COATINGS ISSN 1364–5439
8
Industry news continues to provide the same mix of acquisitions, asset disposals and rising raw material and energy prices. Now that major companies have virtually destroyed their own indigenous industrial bases in the western economies by moving their manufacturing facilities to China and other Asian countries, I hope they will take stock of what they have achieved, before they repeat the same policy in India and South America. What they have achieved in China is to turn this undemocratic country into a major industrial base with an insatiable appetite. In simple terms they can no longer compete with the Chinese in these other emergent markets. Already the Chinese have a strong presence in the attractive markets of the Middle East and South America, and the next decade will see the growth of Chinese alternatives to branded products that were once manufactured items in the same country. Although this outcome must be apparent to the major producers they will, of course, pursue this irrational approach to global growth with the passionate commitment of the Lemming. At last there is a published paper devoted to characterizing the performance properties of UV curable powder coatings (see p2). The work described appears to be related to the coating of wooden substrates, but the
performance of cured films at temperatures as low as 70°C implies that the scope for these UV curable powders could be far wider than applications to wood and wood composite materials. The field of powder application to heat sensitive substrates could be expanded to encompass many new construction alternatives to metal. As coatings formulators become more conversant with the basic principles of UV powder coating they will realize its greater potential to become the leading industrial coating in all market areas. The method the research team used to characterize the properties of these UV curable powder coatings systems was most unusual. They did not have access to a laboratory extruder. However, they were not deterred by this obstacle since their objective was to examine the properties of the cured film. Their choice of solvent was difficult to justify but it seemed to work well, and this technique did achieve complete homogeneity of all components with, perhaps, better uniformity of raw materials than that provided by a laboratory extruder. A coating is still a coating whatever its physical state and I doubt whether the presence of a solvent during the evaluation of a powder coating would have a marked effect on the conclusions. This work highlighted an important aspect of resin
POWDER COATINGS POWDER COATINGS POWDER COATINGS POWDER COATINGS
FOCUS development: the performance of a UV powder coatings system improves, the closer the glass transition temperature is to the melting point. One of the surprising features of this month’s Focus on Powder Coatings is the large number of new products and new application techniques that are reported. Many of these are developments by medium to small sized companies, and this trend is possibly motivated by rationalization on the part of most major coatings producers. Smaller companies can not hope to compete with the majors in the supply of large volume conventional market applications, but there are many small demands for specialized coatings, which have a disruptive effect on high volume production schedules. These troublesome smalls often command a premium price and these items should become entirely the province of the small to medium coating producer. There is still room in the coatings market for young entrepreneurs to establish a sound profitable business based on their ingenuity and youthful dedication. You can never beat the major companies but you can join them to the benefit of both parties. Sid Harris
TECHNICAL Photopolymerization of UV powder coatings An article by a French research team describes a study of the characteristics of UV powder coating resins and their film properties. RT-FTIR spectroscopy was used to follow photopolymerization reactions of UV powder coating systems under close temperature control. The effect of adding acrylate monomers into the UV powder systems was examined and linked to the properties of the cured 2
ON
POWDER
coatings. An increase in the amount of reactive monomer was found to give higher reactivity, even at relatively low working temperatures. Glass transition temperature, crosslinking density, solvent and scratch resistance were found to be significantly improved. Two commercial UV difunctional powder resins were selected for this assessment: a urethane acrylate (UA), and an unsaturated polyester methacrylate (PEMA). Additional acrylate monomers with differing degrees of functionality were used in the preparation of some of the formulations examined in this study. These included: hexanediol diacrylate (HDDA), trimethylolpropaene triacrylate (TMPTA) and pentaerythritol tetra-acrylate (SR295). Irgacure 2959 was the chosen photoinitiator used at 2% addition on total resin. Chloroform was the selected solvent. This group did not have access to an extruder and the resins were dissolved in the solvent at 57% solids. The solution was applied to wooden panels to give a dry film thickness of 60μm after evaporation of the solvent by heating at 110°C for 20 minutes. The techniques used for assessing the reactivity of each system are standard irradiation procedures carried out after the deposited film is melted at temperatures between 50 and 110°C for approximately 5 minutes. Once the optimum curing parameters had been decided, then a range of coated panels were prepared for tests that characterized the properties of each cured system. Thermal stability of the various blends was examined by DSc analysis, and no thermal degradation was observed from 20 to 110°C. Size exclusion chromatography (SEC) gave average molecular weights for UA of 2000 g.mol-1 and 6000 g.mol-1 for PEMA. RT-FTIR analysis gave the expected result that the lower molecular weight polymer UA is more reactive than the high
C O AT I N G S molecular weight PEMA. The melt viscosity of UA is also much lower than that of the PEMA. This test also showed that increased temperature also increases the reactivity of each formulation. Again, a logical conclusion, since the film must be molten to facilitate complete crosslinking of the polymers. If it is necessary to increase the reactivity at a lower temperature because of the temperature tolerance of the substrate then this can be achieved by adding between 5 and 20% of a more reactive multifunctional monomer to the difunctional powder resin. However, the increase in reactivity can adversely affect the degree of conversion and raise the Tg of the final cured film. In conclusion, it seems that the addition of multifunctional monomers does cause some vitrification, which can limit the degree of polymer conversion. This does not appear to have an adverse effect on the scratch and solvent resistance of the modified films. It can also reduce the gap in film performance between the UA and PEMA systems and allow coatings to be cured at temperatures as low as 70°C. Article entitled “Photopolymerization Process of UV Powders. Characterization of Coating Properties” by researchers at the University of Haute Alsace, France. Original Source: Progress in Organic Coatings (Feb-Mar 2012) 73 (2-3), 250-256 (Website: http://www.sciencedirect.com) © Elsevier BV 2012
INDUSTRY NEWS AkzoNobel merger approved The merger of AkzoNobel Coatings India, AkzoNobel Chemicals (India) and AkzoNobel Car Refinishes India Pvt Ltd with AkzoNobel India has been given approval. Original Source: Business Standard, 9 Feb 2012, 14 (189), I.2 (Website: http://www.business-standard.com/)
APRIL 2012
THE DOWNWARD PATH TO INDUSTRIAL GROWTH?
APRIL 2012 In this issue
TECHNICAL
2
Photopolymerization of UV powder coatings
INDUSTRY NEWS
2-5
AkzoNobel merger approved AkzoNobel expands in Asia DuPont seeking buyer for automotive coatings business Cytec announces price increase for powder coating resins in The Americas
NEW PRODUCTS
5-6
Nihon Seiko to market two new antimony compounds Hiroichi Kagaku Kogyo to offer cold spray coating process Valspar patents dispersion-coated powder colouring system
MARKETS
6-8
Government urged to encourage large-scale titanium dioxide projects in India Chemical earnings resist slowdown Dow Chemical 4Q and FY 2011: Coatings and Infrastructure Solutions results
EVENTS
AN INTERNATIONAL NEWSLETTER MONITORING TECHNICAL AND COMMERCIAL DEVELOPMENTS IN POWDER COATINGS ISSN 1364–5439
8
Industry news continues to provide the same mix of acquisitions, asset disposals and rising raw material and energy prices. Now that major companies have virtually destroyed their own indigenous industrial bases in the western economies by moving their manufacturing facilities to China and other Asian countries, I hope they will take stock of what they have achieved, before they repeat the same policy in India and South America. What they have achieved in China is to turn this undemocratic country into a major industrial base with an insatiable appetite. In simple terms they can no longer compete with the Chinese in these other emergent markets. Already the Chinese have a strong presence in the attractive markets of the Middle East and South America, and the next decade will see the growth of Chinese alternatives to branded products that were once manufactured items in the same country. Although this outcome must be apparent to the major producers they will, of course, pursue this irrational approach to global growth with the passionate commitment of the Lemming. At last there is a published paper devoted to characterizing the performance properties of UV curable powder coatings (see p2). The work described appears to be related to the coating of wooden substrates, but the
performance of cured films at temperatures as low as 70°C implies that the scope for these UV curable powders could be far wider than applications to wood and wood composite materials. The field of powder application to heat sensitive substrates could be expanded to encompass many new construction alternatives to metal. As coatings formulators become more conversant with the basic principles of UV powder coating they will realize its greater potential to become the leading industrial coating in all market areas. The method the research team used to characterize the properties of these UV curable powder coatings systems was most unusual. They did not have access to a laboratory extruder. However, they were not deterred by this obstacle since their objective was to examine the properties of the cured film. Their choice of solvent was difficult to justify but it seemed to work well, and this technique did achieve complete homogeneity of all components with, perhaps, better uniformity of raw materials than that provided by a laboratory extruder. A coating is still a coating whatever its physical state and I doubt whether the presence of a solvent during the evaluation of a powder coating would have a marked effect on the conclusions. This work highlighted an important aspect of resin
POWDER COATINGS POWDER COATINGS POWDER COATINGS POWDER COATINGS
FOCUS development: the performance of a UV powder coatings system improves, the closer the glass transition temperature is to the melting point. One of the surprising features of this month’s Focus on Powder Coatings is the large number of new products and new application techniques that are reported. Many of these are developments by medium to small sized companies, and this trend is possibly motivated by rationalization on the part of most major coatings producers. Smaller companies can not hope to compete with the majors in the supply of large volume conventional market applications, but there are many small demands for specialized coatings, which have a disruptive effect on high volume production schedules. These troublesome smalls often command a premium price and these items should become entirely the province of the small to medium coating producer. There is still room in the coatings market for young entrepreneurs to establish a sound profitable business based on their ingenuity and youthful dedication. You can never beat the major companies but you can join them to the benefit of both parties. Sid Harris
TECHNICAL Photopolymerization of UV powder coatings An article by a French research team describes a study of the characteristics of UV powder coating resins and their film properties. RT-FTIR spectroscopy was used to follow photopolymerization reactions of UV powder coating systems under close temperature control. The effect of adding acrylate monomers into the UV powder systems was examined and linked to the properties of the cured 2
ON
POWDER
coatings. An increase in the amount of reactive monomer was found to give higher reactivity, even at relatively low working temperatures. Glass transition temperature, crosslinking density, solvent and scratch resistance were found to be significantly improved. Two commercial UV difunctional powder resins were selected for this assessment: a urethane acrylate (UA), and an unsaturated polyester methacrylate (PEMA). Additional acrylate monomers with differing degrees of functionality were used in the preparation of some of the formulations examined in this study. These included: hexanediol diacrylate (HDDA), trimethylolpropaene triacrylate (TMPTA) and pentaerythritol tetra-acrylate (SR295). Irgacure 2959 was the chosen photoinitiator used at 2% addition on total resin. Chloroform was the selected solvent. This group did not have access to an extruder and the resins were dissolved in the solvent at 57% solids. The solution was applied to wooden panels to give a dry film thickness of 60μm after evaporation of the solvent by heating at 110°C for 20 minutes. The techniques used for assessing the reactivity of each system are standard irradiation procedures carried out after the deposited film is melted at temperatures between 50 and 110°C for approximately 5 minutes. Once the optimum curing parameters had been decided, then a range of coated panels were prepared for tests that characterized the properties of each cured system. Thermal stability of the various blends was examined by DSc analysis, and no thermal degradation was observed from 20 to 110°C. Size exclusion chromatography (SEC) gave average molecular weights for UA of 2000 g.mol-1 and 6000 g.mol-1 for PEMA. RT-FTIR analysis gave the expected result that the lower molecular weight polymer UA is more reactive than the high
C O AT I N G S molecular weight PEMA. The melt viscosity of UA is also much lower than that of the PEMA. This test also showed that increased temperature also increases the reactivity of each formulation. Again, a logical conclusion, since the film must be molten to facilitate complete crosslinking of the polymers. If it is necessary to increase the reactivity at a lower temperature because of the temperature tolerance of the substrate then this can be achieved by adding between 5 and 20% of a more reactive multifunctional monomer to the difunctional powder resin. However, the increase in reactivity can adversely affect the degree of conversion and raise the Tg of the final cured film. In conclusion, it seems that the addition of multifunctional monomers does cause some vitrification, which can limit the degree of polymer conversion. This does not appear to have an adverse effect on the scratch and solvent resistance of the modified films. It can also reduce the gap in film performance between the UA and PEMA systems and allow coatings to be cured at temperatures as low as 70°C. Article entitled “Photopolymerization Process of UV Powders. Characterization of Coating Properties” by researchers at the University of Haute Alsace, France. Original Source: Progress in Organic Coatings (Feb-Mar 2012) 73 (2-3), 250-256 (Website: http://www.sciencedirect.com) © Elsevier BV 2012
INDUSTRY NEWS AkzoNobel merger approved The merger of AkzoNobel Coatings India, AkzoNobel Chemicals (India) and AkzoNobel Car Refinishes India Pvt Ltd with AkzoNobel India has been given approval. Original Source: Business Standard, 9 Feb 2012, 14 (189), I.2 (Website: http://www.business-standard.com/)
APRIL 2012