Why paint steel?

Often asked by engineers, owners and

fabricators, there is no one simple answer.
The most common answer is not necessarily the “best answer”.
The most common reason that steel is painted is for esthetic
reasons. Engineers spend hundreds of hours engineering and
planning. Fabricators spend as many hours cutting, welding,
bolting and erecting and sometimes what the owner and public ®

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sees is rust, stains, and weld spatter. Therefore, paint.
On everything from exposed structural steel in a shopping
mall to steel on a major bridge, the public today is used to

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and expects to see color... color that either lends interest and
excitement to the project or, in the case of many projects, blends Paint Questions
the construction into the surrounding environment. By Roscoe (Skip) Pendry

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The second and more important reason to paint steel is to
protect it from the environment and extend thet life of the Well thought out, specified and applied coating systems
righ it is also

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project. While this is the more important yreason, have been extending the service life of steel for many, many
the most misunderstood and more diffi
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Cocult in the decision years and that is the most important answer to the question;
making process. The color is easy. When deciding what coating why paint steel?

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to use to protect steel from the environment, there are many Now… what generic type product should be used? This
considerations that are often over looked. is a much harder question to answer, because almost every

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To get it right, one must start at the very beginning of the situation, environment, and application is different.
process and answer important questions: A few years ago this question could be answered in a very

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1. What surface preparation can or will be done? general way by saying, the less aggressive the environment the

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a. Structural steel in a fabricators shop can most often “lower the performance” of the coating needed to be. On a

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be blasted prior to coating application, however a scale of performance from lowest to highest, the list would

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water tank or petroleum storage tank in an have been: acrylic, alkyd, epoxy, zinc rich, and urethane. Then

open air blasting.

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urban environment many times will not allow for the systems and combinations would rank from one coat of
any of these, to generic types, to systems that used two and

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b. Surface preparation is one of the key factors in deciding three coats in combination. Today the question is much more

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what coatings may be used, how long the system will
last and how long the steel will be protected.
complicated because of the advancements made in coatings
technology and chemistry by paint manufacturers world wide.

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2. Where will the coating be done? Is the specification being Today there are acrylic coatings that will out perform alkyds
written for shop or field application, and will all fabri- and there are two coat systems that will out perform three coat
cators bidding the project be capable of shop application? systems. What was “best” even three years ago has changed.
a. A coating chosen for shop application may be very So, what’s the answer? The answer is that if you are an en-
impractical for field application due to application gineer specifying a coating or coatings system, or an owner-
equipment requirements. buying paint, contact any of the companies who manufacture
b. A coating chosen for application in the controlled products for steel and talk with a knowledgeable paint and
environment of a fabricators shop may be a major coatings representative. Explain what you are painting, describe
problem for field application due to temperature, the environment and ask for a specific recommendation for that
humidity, or dew point restrictions. specific project or item. In response, you may get totally differ-
3. What is the environment the steel is being placed in? ent suggestions from different experts. None of them will be
a. This sounds like an easy question to answer; wrong, just different.
new trends, new techniques and current industry issues

is it sea coast, desert, urban; are there chemicals, is it Consider asking the question, what should I use on exposed
wet or dry? structural steel? In a dry urban area the answer might be one
b. The environment must consider not just the project coat of alkyd primer and one coat of alkyd finish coat. Move
being coated, but the surrounding area as well. An the exposed structural steel to a seacoast area within three to
example might be exposed structural steel in a paper five miles of salt water, and the answer becomes one coat of a
mill or chemical plant. At first glance one might zinc rich primer, an intermediate coat of epoxy, and a finish
INSIGHTS

think a two coat alkyd system would be an accept- coat of urethane. Or, as previously mentioned, consider some
able system to specify and apply. However when of the newer technology where in the dry area one coat of direct
considering the prevailing wind directions and the to metal urethane will out perform the two coats of alkyd and
possibility of fall out, venting, spills, etc. from in the seacoast area one coat of zinc rich primer with one coat
nearby process equipment it may be better to of high performance urethane will perform as well as the three
consider a high performance chemical resistant coat system. You can readily see the need to consider each
system such as Zinc, Epoxy, and Urethane. project individually. While there are two recommendations for
These are a just a few of the things to consider when deciding the same steel in the same area, neither is wrong, just different
what coating or coating system will be best. The more of the based on the available technology and experience of the person
what, where, when, how and what if questions are answered in you are asking the question of.▪
the planning and specification stage, the better the system and
the longer the service life of the coating and the steel. Skip Pendry is the Focus Market Manager for the Steel
Fabrication Industry at The Sherwin-Williams Company.
He can be reached at sbpendry@sherwin.com.

STRUCTURE magazine 42 February 2006