20 POWDER COATING, February 2013

Acrylic Powder Coatings

TECHNICAL ARTICLE

Innovations in GMA acrylic powder

coatings
Szuping Lu, Ph.D. Anderson Development Co.

Acrylic powder coating is one of the most important From mid 1990-2000, the Big Three US automakers
powder coating systems. It is well-known to provide a (Ford, General Motors, and Chrysler) plus major paint-
hard, weather-durable coating with good chemical makers formed the Low Emission Paint Consortium
resistance. The GMA acrylic powder coating especially (LEPC) and worked together under the same roof in the
provides exceptional smoothness and clarity (if in clear- Ford Wixom Michigan plant. The optimum low emission
coat) that makes it the best choice for automotive clear- car body painting system was defined as powder primer-
coat applications. However, due to certain coating prop- surfacer, waterborne basecoat, and powder clear topcoat.
Although car body clear topcoat has not yet become real
erties, economic, and production issues, acrylic powder
in the US since that time, BMW did build a full car body
coating has not been widely accepted in the general
powder clear-coat line in 1996 at its Dingolfing plant in
powder coating industry, and its market share in the
Germany.
powder coating industry is still low.
Quickly, the acrylic based powder clear-coats were
Researchers have been working on many improve- expanded to five of BMW’s assembly plants in Ger-
ments of acrylic powder coating, including new resin many. Since the 2000s, due to cosmetic and perfor-
design, hardeners, and additives, to overcome its mance advantages, and styling flexibility, aluminum
weaknesses, maintain its strengths, and widen its wheels became standard options for most models of
applications not only in automotive applications, but cars produced in the US and Europe. Again, due to its
also in low-temperature-cure, architectural, and other high smoothness, clarity, and exceptional weathering
applications. durability, GMA acrylic powder coatings found their
best fit in automotive aluminum wheel applications.
This application has been quickly spread to all auto-
motive wheel markets globally. Due to this fast-growing
MA acrylic powder coatings were first introduced

G
application, GMA acrylic powder coatings have gained
in the 1970s. In Japan, acrylic powder coating was attention again, and many powder coatings manufac-
first commercially used as a pigmented powder turers along with resin-makers are working closely for
topcoat for Nissan Datsun trucks. In the early 1990s, new applications.
Harley Davidson in the US started the first commer-
cial application of acrylic powder clear-coat. At about GMA acrylic powder coating technologies
the same time, the pigmented GMA acrylic based pow-
To better understand GMA acrylic powder coating tech-
der coatings were also widely used for automotive
nologies, here’s a brief review of the resins and harden-
primer-surfacer and many trim parts. During that
ers used in this system compared with other thermoset-
time, Mitsui Toatsu Chemicals, now Mitsui Chemicals,
ting powder coating systems.
transferred its GMA resin production technology to its
subsidiary Anderson Development Co. in the US to In general, there are five main families of thermoset-
support the fast growing demand of GMA acrylic pow- ting powder coating systems. They are Epoxy, Polyester,
der coatings in automotive applications due to the Epoxy-Polyester Hybrid, Polyurethane, and Acrylic. Fig-
growing concerns of reducing volatile organic com- ure 1 shows the basic structure and curing chemistry of
pounds (VOCs) for automotive coatings. each these five systems.
 POWDER COATING, February 2013 21

As shown in Figure 1, acrylic powder coatings include From this information about resin construction, you can
three sub-systems depending on the functional groups easily understand why GMA acrylic powder coatings
in the acrylic resin used. The three types of acrylic resins can melt and cure much faster than other powder coating
are hydroxyl functional acrylics (HFA), carboxylic func- systems. The coatings also have much higher cross-link-
tional acrylics (CFA), and epoxy functional acrylics usu- ing density, which contributes to good solvent resistance
ally called GMA acrylics. GMA acrylics got its name due in general. Figure 2 compares the powder melt-curing
to the use of Glycidyl MethAcrylate monomer for its profile and cross-linking density measured by rheometer
epoxy functional group. between polyester and GMA acrylic powder coatings.

Depending on the desired resin glass transition temper- To meet the high-quality demand in automotive appli-
ature (Tg), melt viscosity, flow, gel time, and specific coat- cations, GMA acrylic powder coatings manufacturers
ing cross-linking density or properties, resin-makers often work closely with GMA acrylic resin-makers on
might select from very wide ranges of monomers as selecting suitable GMA resin or even designing new
listed in Table 1, and construct them through free radi- GMA resin to optimize the total powder coating formu-
cal polymerization to specific molecular weights. lation, manufacturing process, storage and transporta-

For GMA powder coating applications, most of the GMA

acrylic resins contain 10 percent to more than 50 per-
Table 1
cent of glycidyl methacrylate monomers, which result in Most used monomers for acrylic powder coating resins
the acrylic resin having epoxy equivalent weight (EEW)
ranging from less than 300 to more than 1,000. Their
molecular weight (MW) could range from less than
3,000 to higher than 20,000. That makes the GMA
acrylic resin capable of carrying an epoxy functionality
from as low as 3-4 to more than 60 in one molecule, com-
pletely different from other powder coating systems such
as epoxy or polyester, which have 2 or very rarely more
than 4 functionalities in one resin molecule.

Figure 1
Major thermosetting powder coating systems

Figure 2
Melting-curing profile of GMA acrylic and polyester
powder coatings
22 POWDER COATING, February 2013

tion of the powder coating, baking, and coating perfor- ages used in other powder coating systems are also used
mances. Furthermore, the GMA acrylic resin-makers in GMA acrylic powder coatings systems. However, the
need to have strict process and quality control to supply selection and dose of each additive and powder manu-
consistently high quality GMA acrylic resins. Table 2 is a facturing process (including final particle size classifica-
list of commonly used GMA acrylic resins offered by tion) can make the GMA powder coatings very different
Anderson Development Co. from one coating manufacturer to another even if the
same GMA acrylic resin is used.
In general, most of GMA acrylic powder coatings are for-
mulated with dodecanedioic acid (DDDA) as the hard- Although the coating properties could be very different
ener, although some other chain lengths of dibasic acids, depending on the coating manufacturing process, exam-
polyanhydrides, or –COOH functional polyester are also ples of coating formulations, process, and expected coat-
used to introduce some specific coating properties. Those ing properties are given in Table 3 by using three of
powder coating additives such as leveling agents, Anderson Development’s Almatex GMA acrylic resins.
degassing agents, and UVA/HALS light stabilizer pack-
New aspects of GMA powder coatings
Although GMA acrylic powder coatings offer all of the
Table 2 previously mentioned unique benefits and properties,
Examples of common GMA acrylic powder coating resins and have been widely used in various automotive appli-
cations plus some agricultural equipment and high end
household appliances and hardware items, they are also
known as high cost, hard to matt, brittle, and incompat-
ible with other powder coating systems. Due to these
concerns, many of powder coatings manufacturers skip
this unique powder coating system even though they are
aware it could offer them the coating properties they
need. After much research, however, innovative resin
technologies are available to go along with new hard-
ener and additive technologies to bring in new aspects of
GMA acrylic powder coatings in the following areas:

Polyester compatibility. By introducing new mon-

omers, GMA acrylic powder coating resins exhibit much
improved polyester compatibility. Although no two dif-
Table 3 ferent powder coating chemistries can be fully compati-
Examples of GMA acrylic powder coatings ble, good housekeeping in powder coating operations, or
in all coating industry operations for that matter, is
always required. The Almatex AP4411 type of GMA
acrylic resin does offer the industry much improved
polyester compatibility. One of the major powder coat-
ings makers in Europe actually commercialized a new
series of polyester compatible GMA acrylic powder coat-
ings in recent years. These new GMA acrylic powders
can be manufactured and used along existing polyester
powder coating operations with only some better house-
keeping required and without the need to build a new
production and application line. Figure 3 shows the

Figure 3
Improvement of polyester compatibility by new
GMA resin
Baking Conditions

Conventional GMA powder Almatex AP4411 based GMA powder

coating contaminates into black coating contaminates into black
polyester powder coating causing polyester powder coating causing
several craters no craters
 POWDER COATING, February 2013 23

improvement of polyester compatibility from AP4411 Furthermore, the selection and dose of catalyst should
GMA acrylic resin. Figure 4 also shows examples of two not reduce the powder shelf life to an unacceptable limit.
pigmented high- and low-gloss polyester compatible It would require both resin and powder coatings manu-
GMA acrylic powder coatings made by a powder coat- facturers to work together closely to come out with an
ings manufacturer. acceptable industrial low temperature cure powder coat-
ing. Figure 5 includes an example of a prototype of a
GMA acrylic matting resin. Although using GMA GMA powder coating cured at 125°C on an automotive
acrylics as matting additives in polyester low gloss pow- bumper.
der coatings is not new, batch-to-batch reproducibility,
storage stability, and coating burnish resistance still Other improved GMA powder coatings. By using
need to be improved. A newly developed Almatex MT- new GMA resin design, new hardeners, or special addi-
2780 GMA acrylic matting resin offers the industry tives, GMA acrylic powder coatings can also be more cor-
another alternative for producing GMA acrylic-poly- rosion resistant and flexible with high mar/scratch resis-
ester hybrid low gloss powder coatings that are consis- tance. They can also accept high pigment load or further
tent, and have good storage stability and better bur- extend weather durability well beyond conventional lev-
nish and solvent resistance. Table 4 gives examples of
els. Figure 6 shows some of these improvements.
the wide ranges of acrylic-polyester hybrid low gloss
powder coatings that could be made with this new
acrylic matting resin. Table 4
Low-temperature cure. Compared with other pow- Acrylic-polyester hybrid low gloss coatings based on
der coating systems, GMA acrylic powder coatings Almatex MT2780 with wide ranges of polyesters
already carry relatively lower temperature cure. As
reported, the automotive full body clear powder coating
were cured at 145°C while most of the other powder
coating systems were cured at 180°C or higher. To fur-
ther reduce GMA powder coating curing temperature
to 130°C and lower, it is required to optimize the selec-
tion of GMA resin, hardeners, and catalyst to ensure
that the powder can melt, flow, and cure sufficiently.

Figure 4
Pigmented high and low gloss polyester compatible
GMA acrylic powder coatings

Figure 6
Critical coating properties improvement of GMA acrylic
powder coatings
Figure 5
Example of low temperature cured GMA powder
coating on automotive bumper

Improvement of corrosion resistance by

new resin design

Improvement of Improvement of
pigmentation by flexibility by novel
novel dispersion hardener
agent

Improvement of mar/scratch resistance

by new resin design
24 POWDER COATING, February 2013

Conclusion Editor’s note

The same as other technologies, GMA acrylic powder For more information, see Powder Coating magazine’s
coating has its strengths and weaknesses as introduced website at [www.pcoating.com]. Click on Article Index,
in this article. Through continuous research from resin Subjects, where you’ll find numerous case histories and
and other supporting raw materials suppliers and pow- technical articles for sale on the topics covered in this arti-
der coatings manufacturers, GMA acrylic powder coat- cle. If you would like to submit a question, click on Problem
ings can keep finding new fits in powder coating appli- solving. Select the column that fits your question, fill out
cations. We can expect that these powder coatings can the form, and send it to us.
be more acceptable in the future of innovation in the
powder coating industry. PC

Szuping Lu, Ph.D., is senior scientist

and manager of global R&D/Tech. ser-
vice of acrylic resins for Anderson
Development Co., 1415 E. Michigan St.,
Adrian, MI 49221. He received his B.S.
degree in Chemical Engineering from
References National Taiwan University in 1983
Streitberger, H. and Dossel, K., eds., Automotive Paints and Coatings (John and his Ph.D. in Polymer Science from
Wiley & Sons: Hoboken, N.J.), 2008.
the University of Detroit Mercy in 1993. He has been
Poth, U., Automotive Coatings Formulation (Vincentz Network), 2008.
involved in powder coating research work for more than 20
Pettit, P., “Technology Broadens Horizons for Acrylic Powder Coatings,” years. He has published five powder coating technical
Powder Coating magazine, March 2001.
papers, and holds more than 10 US and foreign powder
D.R., “Automotive OEM Powder Clearcoat,” Paint & Coating Industry mag-
azine, April 2004. coating related patents. He can be contacted at 517/438-5272;
Lu, S., “New Aspects of GMA Powder Coatings,” presentation at Powder e-mail [[email protected]]; website [www.anderson
Coating Summit 2012.        
development.com].

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