For industrial centers, such as manufacturing plants, processing centers, and storage tanks, avoiding corrosion is a seriously crucial functional and safety concern. Nevertheless, direct exposure to chemicals, chlorides, wetness, and humidity, whether indoors or out, is a destructive mix that can reduce the service life of everything made from steel, such as tanks, pipelines, sidewalks, center structures, and external facilities. Since steel corrosion is a serious concern in such installations, re-priming and repainting typically occur every couple of years.
While industrial primers represent an important structure for paints and coatings in severe environments, they have historically been unable to handle the eventual development and reoccurrence of rust successfully. Standard primers encapsulate rust until the paint/primer is scratched, chipped, or breached, and moisture and oxygen migrate under the movie, enabling the corrosion to spread.
As a result, upkeep personnel or coating applicators must repeatedly utilize costly, lengthy, and ecologically harmful surface preparation techniques such as sandblasting to prepare surface areas for priming and repainting.
When sandblasting is required, it can considerably extend the time a facility is shut down for recoating and upkeep, consisting of set up, clean up and needing to stop work near the blast zone for security. Although efforts are made at containment, the blasting creates a hazardous dust cloud that can wander for miles even after the bigger particles settle.
However, not all environments can stand up to sandblasting, which can backfire, harm important surface areas, and even get into gears and mechanical devices. It can likewise be impractical for reaching hard-to-access locations such as fractures and crevices.
Now advanced guides have been developed that set a greater performance bar in corrosive commercial environments. These reactive guides go beyond encapsulating rust to convert it to a protective product (iron phosphate) to lessen the threat of further corrosion. The chemical bond supplies superior adhesion and corrosion defense while eliminating under-film corrosion.
The rust conversion formulation also varies from previous technologies by using a non-toxic, ultra-low-VOC, water-based acrylic polymer option that can be applied with minimal surface area preparation without the need to sandblast steel substrates.
Eliminating sandblast requirement can improve safety, device dependability, and lower total facility shutdown time by as much as 30%. This can translate into millions of dollars in cost savings if a large facility is returned to production a week or two early.
Primer Pitfalls Allow Corrosion
One of the primary reasons that commercial centers are so vulnerable to corrosion is that conventional primers have serious shortages in this area. A typical failure of guides is not adequately protecting against under film corrosion.
A primer should initially form a reliable chemical bond to the metal substrate. Without this, rust promoters like chemicals, oxygen, moisture, and humidity will sneak beneath the primer, triggering more corrosion. Many primers only encapsulate the iron oxide, which is not 100% reliable in preventing additional corrosion.
Another factor that many industrial facilities are prone to rust when utilizing normal guides is that a high level of surface preparation is needed because most corrosion guides are sensitive to chlorides.
Even a minute amount of chloride on the steel can trigger a coating system failure. This is why leading coating manufacturers require severe surface cleaning levels (sandblasting) and chloride elimination to a level of 5 mcg/m2, which is nearly difficult to achieve. Even when sandblasting is used for surface preparation, flash rusting occurs.
In reaction, the search for longer-lasting corrosion security for industrial facilities has included the development of lasting guides that remedy traditional shortages.
Lasting Corrosion Protection
ArmorThane’s Primer WC-111, for example, works by chemically reacting with iron and iron oxide (rust) to form iron phosphate and creates a nano bond with both metallic and painted surfaces. The chemically bonded layer is insoluble and incredibly corrosion-resistant. This “bonding” process likewise provides superior adhesion and flexibility and stops under film corrosion that takes place when conventional coatings are harmed.
The non-toxic, ultra-low-VOC primer includes nano polymers for extra strength and resilience. It has been checked to successfully coat surface areas from rust-free to approximately 700 microns of rust. The elasticity of the innovative primer makes it very durable in temperature level variations from -67 ° C to +200 ° C (-90 ° F to 400 ° F).
Because the innovative guide chemically responds with a galvanized steel surface area, no surface preparation is needed other than a water wash. The water-based acrylic polymer is not sensitive to chlorides or rust and can neutralize them. Unlike initial generations of rust-converting primers, the guide carries out equally well on tidy, partly rusted, and greatly rusted surfaces.
Typically, a power wash (240 bar/3,500 psi) is all that is required before applying to steel (clean or corroded), galvanized steel, or aluminum to eliminate loose paint, dirt, and grease. The primer can be applied to a corroded surface area by hand brush, roller, or airless spray gun on the substrate. After the application of the guide, a single coat of a low-VOC overcoat will complete the job.
The guide has effectively been used on a variety of industrial applications to rapidly and cost successfully deter corrosion without substantial surface area preparation.
A pulp and paper factory in Queensland, Australia, utilized the coating on a crane sidewalk that had ended up being significantly worn away and weathered due to mechanical damage and regular usage in a high‑humidity (~ 90%) and high-temperature (~ 40 ° C) environment.
To improve operational security and function, the manufacturing plant just recently sought an easy, time and economical coating service, suitable with the presently utilized overcoat that could be used directly to rusted metal.
Due to its properties, ArmorThane’s Primer WC-111 was picked for a trial application. The sidewalk was high-pressure water blasted at 4,500 PSI to remove loose or flaking rust and paint and ensure the substrate was free from any contaminants. Heavily rusted areas were spot primed, and two coatings of primer were applied, followed by one coat of ArmorThane Hardcoat.
The combined system has provided corrosion protection versus extreme commercial conditions to date, and the results are being observed as the trial continues.
Compared to common sandblasting, nevertheless, the nominal surface preparation requirements, along with the capability to be used straight to rusted substrate, have assisted in minimizing operational downtime for maintenance. The primer’s capability to convert rust to iron phosphate also bodes well for comprehensive security against corrosion, even in an industrial work setting prone to devise damage because it will help to get rid of under film corrosion.
While the industrial sector has long fought corrosion, using advanced primers that convert rust into a protective layer and eliminate the need to sandblast promises to help keep facilities and production facilities in good working order for longer, with less expensive maintenance, than standard techniques.
Check out what Cove Coatings did with ArmorThane’s WC-111 below.
