Growth for metallic pigments

Pigment & Resin Technology

ISSN: 0369-9420

Article publication date: 1 August 1998

222

Keywords

Citation

Bean, J. (1998), "Growth for metallic pigments", Pigment & Resin Technology, Vol. 27 No. 4. https://doi.org/10.1108/prt.1998.12927daa.001

Publisher

:

Emerald Group Publishing Limited

Copyright © 1998, MCB UP Limited


Growth for metallic pigments

Keywords Metallic paints, Paint, Pigments

Growth for metallic pigments

A recent report from John D. Kerr of Silberline gives an up-beat picture of what he describes as the "sparkling growth of metallic pigments". He states that the automotive coatings market has shown dramatic growth in metallic effects. The proportion of metallics and so called "mica metallics or metallescents" now accounts for around 60 per cent of all topcoats, the remainder being solid colours.

Apart from basecoat/clearcoat in automotive, ancillary parts such as alloy wheels, wheeltrims, headlamps and engine components have also grown in their use of metallic effects. The production of recreational vehicles (RV) has increased dramatically in recent years, again with the major styling trend of metallic effects. Motorcycle bodies and parts are spray coated or powder coated, with an increased trend to injection moulding of plastic parts.

The leisure industry is also a very fast growing market and has created high demand, where metallics are perceived as a "sporty effect" in examples such as tennis/squash racquets, golf clubs, ski boots, skis and exercise equipment. Peripheral accessories such as soccer boots, training shoes, goggles, sport and ski apparel, have all adopted metallic effects.

For the future John Kerr says that there are a number of new or emerging technologies for the coatings market. First there are a series of coloured metallic pigments which will open a new palette of coloured effects. Extra sparkle spheres are third generation pigments which are spherical in geometry. They will offer the development of very clean colours with no flip-flop. In many applications, the coatings applied onto plastic substrates have been replaced by injection moulding or blow moulding to achieve coloured metallic effect. This trend is likely to continue for reasons of environmental legislation, economics and performance.

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