You have a very important investment in the contents of your industrial or manufacturing facility. Whether you own that facility, have the responsibility for maintaining it, or both, this facility represents a vital element for your business and profits, as well as representing a liability if neglected. Protecting that investment is your roof, which attracts little attention until it leaks.

Working tirelessly and quietly 24 hours a day, 365 days a year for many years, your industrial roof is exposed to the elements, weather, sun, airborne pollution, rain etc. — all of which take their toll on its metal surface and normally resulting in corrosion.

This is true for basically any metal surface. When you make anything out of mild steel, you have 1 of 3 options:

1. Galvanise it (A very expensive method of corrosion protection)
2. Paint it (paint or powder coating)
3. waste it (mild steel will continue rusting and wasting away unless you halt the process)

The effects of corrosion will cause the roof fasteners to corrode and allow entry for water into your structure if given enough time. Corrosion will also wear through sheet steel, causing it to become very weak, perforated, to leak, and eventually need replacement.

The results of the steel wearing out include costly damages to equipment, inventory, operations, shutdowns, safety hazards, and costly on-going maintenance.

Due to these factors we have a wide range of industrial single pack and twin pack primers, single pack and twin pack top coats, “2 in 1” primer –topcoat systems, to name but a few.

Coatings and Allied have a well equipped team of consultants / representatives that is able to see you on sight and advice on the best, most economic or balanced coating system available to suit your needs.

Decorative Paint is a broad term used to describe the products used in various non-industrial applications. Most commonly the paint you would use to paint a house or building.

This includes a range of water-based and solvent based primers for plaster, acrylic roof paint, a wide variety of acrylic top coats of various sheen levels and quality ranges, as well as varnishes, and enamels.

Basically any paint or coating that you would normally use at your own home would fall into this category. There are also many waterproofing products that would form part of this banner.

We have an expansive range of products covering every aspect of painting your home, walls, roof, window frames, doors, as well as options that suit every pocket.

Please contact us to discuss your painting and coatings needs.

What is a Solvent? Painting tools for solvent-based paints Solvents are substances intended for dissolving, diluting or separating products – in this instance paints and varnishes. Industrial paint applications are often limited to organic solvents. In DIY paints, solvents are still found relatively often in paints for wood surfaces.

There are many different types of individual solvents – roughly one hundred – employed for different applications. Solvents evaporate easily, emitting Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs), which are a potential human health hazard and harmful to the environment.

Standing up to harsh environments…

A manufacturer can use different solvents to produce coatings with very diverse characteristics. For example, modern high-solids paints used in metal protection on bridges and pipelines, give a film (coating) thickness that would require at least two applications of other paint systems.

Increasing functional and environmental performance…

The flexibility given by solvents means that the whole performance of a system can be optimised, not least for the quantity of materials used, resulting in environmental gain. To minimise total consumption of solvents, high-solids paints with lower levels of organic solvents have been developed. These are proving popular where a high quality and durable finish is required. Even for water based coatings, a solvent content of up to 15 per cent is indispensable for high durability and appearance.

Cleaning water-based paint from a brush generally, consumers can choose between two types of paints:

Water-based paints

Solvent-based paints

As their name indicates, solvent-based paints sometimes referred to as “oil-based” or “alkyd” paints, contain a significantly higher level of organic solvents than water-based paints. These solvents are responsible for the strong odour noticeable in buildings that have been freshly painted. They are also potentially hazardous for both human health and for the environment which is why concerted efforts are being made to reduce or remove their presence in paints without negatively impacting on paint performance.

Today, water-based paints dominate and account for roughly 80% of paints sold in the residential market, and is rapidly growing world-wide in the industrial and specialised coatings markets as well.

The function of organic solvents in paint relates to certain properties it brings to facilitates the paints application, its drying, and the formation of a regular paint film. During application and drying, the solvent evaporates. Ideally a dry paint film no longer contains solvent. However when they evaporate, these solvents release Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs) into the atmosphere, with a negative, toxic impact on the environment.

Fifty years ago, virtually all paint was solvent-based. Today, advances in paint technology mean that modern, water-based paints, often referred to as acrylic emulsions, are increasingly replacing organic solvents across a broad range of paint applications and surface areas (and account for 80% of architectural paints). Legislation is in place to support this trend.

Spear headed by (but not limited to) to regulatory developments in Europe, we continue to see stricter paint VOC regulations across the planet.