Quelle/Publication: European Coatings Journal

Ausgabe/Issue: 04/2003
Seite/Page: 154

Surface Drying Time

Philip Green, Paint Technology Consultant, comments on
the definition and practical usage of physical attributes that
are commonly used for the characterisation of coatings.
Contact: Philip@iccorp.co.za
The Surface Drying Time of a coating is a practical measure
of how much time an air dry coating takes to reach a stage
where it can just be touched, or sand impinging on the
surface of the drying coating can be brushed off without
damaging the surface of the coating. It is also known as
sand dry, touch dry and in some markets as the lacquer dry
time (technically, this is not strictly correct, because it
depends on the drying/curing mechanism of coating system)

Practical Usage
There are coatings manufactured today at many different
surface drying times but in general they all fall roughly into
one of the following 5 categories:
a) Ultra quick dry (0-5 minutes) - Normally force dried or UV
cured finishes.
b) Quick dry (5-20 minutes) - Mostly spray applied solvent
based finishes, can also be force dried (usually through
heat), or 2-pack chemically cured coatings.
c) 0.5 to 1 hour - Mostly industrial coatings or OEM finishes,
but also some decorative. Application is usually by spraying,
but also brush and roller in the case of latex based systems.
d) 1.5-3 hours - Again mostly solvent based industrial
finishes, e.g. coach enamels, that can be brush or spray
applied (2 coats in one day).
e) 4-8 hours - Normally standard decorative solvent borne
finishes
Please note that surface drying times depend very much on
the application conditions and application method. Thus,
most laboratory measurements need to include the
application method (wet film thickness) and
temperature/humidity under which the determination was
carried out (normally 23°C and 50% relative humidity are
taken as standard conditions).

Measurement
Surface drying times for category b) to e) described above
are normally determined manually, using a draw down on
glass, with a wet film thickness (WFT) varying somewhat for
different types of paint, typically between 60-70 microns.
The surface dry time is determined as the time when sand
dropped on to the film can be gently brushed off without
damaging the film or leaving marks. For product categories
d) and e), a clockwork/belt driven automatic drying time
recorder and glass panels from several sources can be
used. For very fast drying finishes such as category a) and
b) above methods like Rocker hardness can be used to
determine surface drying times.

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