Art Project Placard

In 1949, a man named Edward Seymour wanted to find a way to paint radiators with
aluminum paint. Edward Seymour's wife Bonnie suggested the use of an aerosol can be filled
with paint. Edward Seymour later founded Seymour of Sycamore, Inc. of Chicago, USA, to
manufacture his spray paints. His invention is used around the world until this day.
During the manufacturing process, the cans are first filled with paint and then injected
with the gas propellant. The valve is then crimped, trapping the highly compressed compound
within the confines of the can. The paint easily binds to surfaces due to the charging of the
particles. The surface is usually ground/sanded down which creates an opposite charge to the
paint. This then allows the paint to easily react with the surface. Spray paints are usually
composed of acrylic or enamel paints (oil). Acrylic
spray paints use of nitro acrylic resin as bases, and are
preferred for things such as murals due to high
pigmentation, being quite opaque, allow for high
coverage and vibrancy (even without priming), being
more UV resistant, maintain vibrance, dry fast (see
graph on the right), and are weather resistant. Enamel
paints, on the other hand, use an alcid resin as a base,
and are usually used on outdoor metal objects or
indoor furnishing.
The propellants used in paint spray cans
usually are dimethyl ether (CH₃OCH₃) or a mixture of
propane (C₃H₈) and butane(C₄H₁₀). If propane or
butane are present in paint spray cans, acetone (CH3COCH3) is usually the solvent. Acetone is a
good solvent due to its ability to dissolve both polar and nonpolar substances, while other
solvents can only dissolve one or the other. Acetone's chemical makeup includes elements that
are both polar and nonpolar which means acetone can be
used with both organic and inorganic substances. The
acrylic paints are composed of a pigment and of
copolymer binders composed of the three monomers:
methyl methacrylate (MMA, C5O2H8), ethyl acrylate (EA,
C5O2H8), and n-butyl acrylate (nBA, C7H12O2).
Copolymers: A product of polymerization, a process in
which relatively small
molecules, called
monomers, combine
chemically to produce
a very large chainlike
or network molecule, called a polymer. These then become
copolymers when two or more monomers are linked in the
same polymer chain. On the left, a graphic depicting
different types of polymers: 1) homopolymer 2) alternating copolymer 3) random copolymer 4)
block copolymer 5) graft copolymer.
 Binders will usually result in less to no paint cracks after having been applied to a
surface. A higher binder – pigment ratio will usually result in higher paint quality. Enamel paints
contain petroleum spirit, white lead, oil, and resinous materials and are resistant to acids, alkalis,
and water. Some of the benefits of the oil base are that it covers more thoroughly in one coat,
shrinks less, takes longer to dry so you have more working time (see graph above), and holds up
well in high-traffic areas. On the other hand, the main drawback of oil paint is that it doesn’t like
mixing with other paints.
One night, after this project was introduced, I was bored and decided to spray paint an
object in my room (outside of course). I was then hit with the idea of spray painting an object for
my chemistry project, and would ultimately follow through with that.
I wasn’t able to acquire my own paints due to the minimum age requirement for buying
spray paint. I then borrowed some from a friend and got to work. The colors were quite funky,
though I was able to make them work (kinda). I started drawing lines that would intersect if they
were to be longer, though on the canvas, they would only come close to each other. I tried using
the black – which was pretty much empty – in combination with other colors, where the black
would act as a buffer on the outside, and the other colors as the focal point. This ultimately
failed, and I only ended up painting a heart with a funky combination of colors surrounding it. I
am happy with how it came out for how few resources I had available to me. Everything went
just about how it was planned.