Melamine coating resins chemistry

Sanding is carried out at this stage and, after clean-up, the final colour or top-coat is applied. There is some variation in the resin chemistry used. Alkyds crosslinked with melamine-formaldehyde are widely used for non-metallic pigmentation. Metallics are usually based on acrylics for better durability. The acrylic may be thermoset with melamine-formaldehyde or a thermoplastic lacquer (plasticised copolymer of methyl methacrylate). A thickness of about 50ftm is applied and stoved for 20 min at 130°C (lacquers receive a bake-sand-bake process for a smoother appearance). 

Melamine and its polymers have uses in many industrial fields. The commercial importance of the compounds is shown by the fact that 34 x 106 kg of melamine was produced in the USA in 1970. The chemistry of the melamine resins has been discussed already (see Chapter 1.11). The major uses of the resins are in the formation of high-pressure laminates for home furniture, and as moldings for crockery. In addition the resins are used in finishing textiles, to improve crease resistance, and as coatings for wet strength paper. 

A wide variety of other specialty monomers are also used to provide specialized performance properties for coating applications. For example, amine functional monomers can be used to improve adhesion to aged alkyd substrates. Specialized monomers can also be used to improve exterior durability, for example VEOVA (vinyl ester of vesatic acid) monomers can improve the hydrolysis resistance of vinyl acetate polymers, and n-butyl methacrylate can be used to enhance the durabiHty of BA-MMA acrylics. Polymer hydrophobicity can be fine tuned by varying the levels of hydrophobic and hydrophilic monomers in the composition and styrene or ethyl hexyl acrylate are used to increase film hydrophobicity and reduce water permeability in BA-MMA systems. Specialty monomers are also used to provide specific chemical functionality to polymer compositions. For example, hydroxyethyl methacrylate can be used to provide hydroxyl functionality to acrylic resins, allowing these polymers to be used in cross-linkable thermoset coatings which cure via melamine chemistry. While specialty monomers are used at relatively low levels in polymer compositions, they frequently provide the performance features needed for the successful application of emulsion polymers in many coating areas. 

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