A New Self-Crosslinking Acrylic Latex Garage Floor and Masonary Application

By Regina Matranga, Barry Goldslager, Bill Brown, Katie Lawhorn

With increased market demands for lower-VOC coatings, formulators face challenges with providing customers with products that meet their expectations. One such challenge is in horizontal masonry and garage floor-type coatings. These coatings must resist common chemicals (such as gasoline, brake fluid, transmission fluid, motor oil, cleaners, etc.), be abrasion resistant, and have hot-tire resistance to prevent peeling and tire stains. In this article, we discuss a new fast-cure self-crosslinking epoxy modified acrylic copolymer latex that can be formulated into <50 g/L VOC coatings. These coatings meet the demands required for garage floor and other horizontal masonry applications (both clear and pigmented).

GARAGE FLOOR COATING CHALLENGES
Garage floor coating formulators have two coating types to offer their customers. A two-component (2K) coating, which consist of a formulated coating base and an external hardener (crosslinker), or a one-component (1K) coating, which consists solely of a formulated base. Two-component garage floor coatings have been the norm in high performance areas, which provide a crosslinking mechanism for improved chemical, stain, and abrasion resistance. These coatings do have short comings though, such as slow cure time, limited potlife, and the need for a hardener to be added before application. One-component garage floor coatings have the advantage of no external hardener, faster cure time, and long-term potlife.

The challenge with 1K coatings is achieving long-term adhesion to the garage floor and resistance to chemicals and stains. A 1K garage floor coating that performs like a 2K one is very desirable for garage floor coating suppliers.