Hydrophobic coatings from emulsion polymers

Abstract

One of the chief requirements of protective coatings is the ability to confer water resistance to painted substrates. To accomplish this task, the coating itself must be water resistant but should also possess the additional performance properties expected of modern coatings. Branched vinyl esters provide the building blocks for preparing very hydrophobic binders by emulsion polymerization. Not only do these monomers have favorable reactivity with vinyl acetate but they also react effectively with acrylates and can be formulated into a wide range of performance coatings. Hydrophobic polymers find use in a wide range of applications including architectural paints, building products and corrosion resistant coatings. In addition to the design of reliable measurements of water resistance, it would be beneficial to be able to predict the water sensitivity of materials based on composition. Calculations of oxygen contents and solubility parameters of polymers are proposed as useful approaches to estimating the hydrophilicity of coatings in order to define the hydrophilic limit imposed on coatings by various water resistance tests.