Heatin' Up

The Effects of Humid Conditions

As the warm weather approaches the US and Canada, heat conditions create a unique challenge to coaters: the need to manage humidity in shops. Depending on what region you do business in and whether you coat with solvent or water-based Teflon™ coatings, conditions can be more or less challenging. If humid conditions persist over a period of time, these coatings can pull in and trap moisture from the air onto your coated part prior to curing. Once parts are cured, the trapped moisture in the coating can disturb adhesion to the substrate. This moisture can also cause intra-coat adhesion failure (between multiple coats), staining, and negatively affect appearance of parts. Read on to find the best preventative actions and solutions to save you time and money when coating in humid conditions.

There are several solutions to mitigate the effects of humidity in your coating facility.

• Basic Solution: Plan the application of your coatings during less humid hours of the day, such as early morning or late afternoon.
• Costly solution: Process parts in an air conditioned environment.
• Common solution: Preheat your part to 150°-175°F prior to coating. After this pre-heating step, spray the part as soon as possible.

Additionally, be mindful of the environment where your parts are stored, and check that the parts are not “sweating” prior to coating. If you spray these sweating parts, the moisture will become trapped under the coating. Should you find parts are sweating, use the pre-heating method mentioned above to remove the moisture prior to spraying.

The Intech Team would like to wish you an exciting, happy, and prosperous summer!

For more industrial coating application information and tips, visit Application Overview for Teflon™ Industrial Coatings on our website.