The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Paint and Body Shop "Baking Enamel" is it still made today?

The original paint on the AD's was Dupont Dulux Baking Enamel and the bodys went through an oven to dry the paint. Is there such a thing still being sold today or has every one gone to the air dry or catalized paints?
Denny Graham
Sandwich, IL

geez, now yer gonna build a bake booth for the resto?

I think you'll find that whatever might be called that nowadays is something much different than whatever additive Dupont originally developed to allow their enamel to be force dried ... from the 50's:
http://www.carrepair-1950.com/car-painting-problems.htm [scroll to see "Wrinkling of Dulux"]
heat tolerant enamel today, neither "authentic"
http://www.wattyl.com.au/Applicators/MT/Products/Default.htm
http://www2.sherwin-williams.com/im/industrialcontractor/permaclad.asp

Bill

I work for a Dupont jobber, so I will look into it for you. Until then, here is the link to their site.

http://www.performancecoatings.dupont.com/bowstreet5/webengine/dpc/common/Controller

I'll let you know what I come up with.

I just got off the phone with Dupont. They do not make anything comparable to that. He told me that "you can pretty much bake anything", which didn't exactly answer my question. However, Nason makes a ful-thane enamel, which he said "would probably be the closest to it."

I'm not sure if this will help you out at all, but I tried. Sorry.

Bill,

Thanks for asking Denny the obvious question.

Tim

well it did seem the only possible motivation, so I just wondered

my take is that the referenced [original] Dupont Baking Enamel was so named to indicate it had additives [a reducer it seems] that allowed heating, which "standard" enamels of the day didn't respond well to .... as Jenny found, all modern paints are formulated to respond to thermal fast dry techniques, aside from the seperate available 'dryers' for most paints

Bill

The only difference between "baking" enamel and plain old enamel are additives to help keep it from orangepeeling or discoloring because of the heat. "Baking" the paint does absolutely nothing to improve the quality or hardness of paint. In fact it can make the overall appearance of the paint poorer. All baking does that could be considered good is speed the cure. It's like putting a drop of water on a glass & putting a fan on it. It dries faster but when it's dry it's no "dryer" than if it'd dried normally.

Well Willie, ya just never know, I do tend to go to extremes at times. Everybody keeps trying to push me in the direction of the base coat/clear coat systems, and I have bought some and I have sprayed a little.
I just like to fill in as many of the blanks as I can when I have a question about something. I do force dry most of my paint anyway. If I spray Rustolium or any of the rattle can paint as soon as I can handle it I stuff it in the oven at about 200° for a couple of hours. I’ve been doing the same thing with some of the PPG DBU with good results.

Thanks for askin’ around Jenny, I appreciate it.

I’ve seen a lot of the auto paint shops have booths set up with heating lamps. I guess what I’m really looking for was some reassurance that the newer paints can be baked.
Hey Thanks guys, oh, and you to Bill.
Denny Graham
Sandwich, IL

I wouldn't recommend base/clear to ya Denny, I don't think that particular kinda gloss looks right on an old truck, I tend to use acrylic enamel ... and the body shops around here use heat lamps [wet climate] to insure dry filler and primer, only paint if it's a spot repair they want to move out fast

Bill

the baked enamel they used to do was under lights it just made the paint harden up faster big hot lights

Everybody keeps trying to push me in the direction of the base coat/clear coat systems . .

I join Bill - not everybody recommends BC/CC for a restored truck. Acrylic Enamel (with hardener) is very good and 2-part urethane (single stage) is hard-wearing and looks more like the original synthetic enamel than would a BC/CC paint job.

For what I have seen, up to 140 degree F heat will speed the drying of many modern paints. Shops might go higher - they want to move the vehicle out ASAP. I have also seen it recommended that 2-part paints should not be heated right away, so that volatiles will not get trapped when the surface sets too early (from a heated-up, speeded-up chemical reaction, catalyzation).

It's been a few years since I looked at a paint product information sheet - I thought they used to have information about recommended methods of drying?

Tim