In the 1980s, there was no professional sedan repair paint industry in China. When each sedan left the factory, the sedan manufacturer would provide a can of sedan repair paint. This is completely because the number of cars in China at that time was very small, and the shopping malls for car repair paint were relatively small, which could not attract attention.

Repair paint shopping malls were first introduced to China by foreign enterprises with advanced skills. The earliest foreign brands to enter China's shopping malls were ICI (Autocolor), AKZO (Xinjin), Herbertz (Schbilt), BASF (Parrot), and DuPont (Xiandali).

In the 1990s, China's sedan industry entered a stage of rapid development. By 2006, China's sedan production had reached over 7.2 million units, with a civilian sedan ownership of 4985 units and a commercial vehicle ownership of over 10 million units. As a result, China's sedan ownership reached 60 million units, and the huge sedan ownership drove the development of sedan repair paint shopping malls. After the first batch of repair paint entering China's shopping malls received considerable profits, more foreign cutting-edge enterprises have also landed in China, such as Nippon Nippon Nippon, Italian Aigou, Tianyida, PPG from the United States, Xuanwei, and Vesper, all closely monitoring this huge repair paint market in China. After famous foreign companies entered China, they directly established a professional car repair paint system using their own practices abroad. With their advanced skills, standard shopping mall sales models, and experience in establishing service networks, they quickly occupied the main shopping malls of car repair paint in China, but together, they also promoted the establishment of a car repair paint system in China, And we have trained a group of senior technicians with professional color matching and construction experience, leaving valuable experience and talents for the development of car repair paint in China. The imported repair paint system has been widely welcomed in various car repair paint systems in China.

When car repair paint was just starting in China, alkyd and amino products were the primary raw materials for producing repair paint, with a price of only 15-40 yuan/kg; But the price of imported repair paint has now reached 100 yuan/liter, and some high-end repair paint with special functions can even be sold for 400 yuan/liter. And this precisely confirms an old saying in our country: "One penny, one penny." Imported repair paint has undergone excellent quality and has been accepted by a wide range of manufacturers. From this, it can also be seen that only real and good products with excellent functions can have shopping malls, even though the price is high, and the price is not the only one that dominates shopping malls.

However, China's shopping malls have entered the stage of internationalization, with various additives for foreign coatings, advanced coloring pigments for car paints, metal pigments, pearlescent pigments, aliphatic isocyanate curing agents, cellulose acetate butyrate (CAB), various paint resins, and special monomers for synthetic resins entering the country first and providing excellent technical services, providing favorable conditions for the development of China's advanced decoration coatings.

The natural color paint used for car repair is mainly made of polyurethane acrylic resin, which has also been produced in China for a long time. After foreign well-known enterprises entered China, they selected some imported additives, which significantly improved the functionality of the products. For example, using cardura E10 to modify hydroxyacrylic resin can improve the wettability of pigments, the leveling, durability, and acid and alkaline resistance of coatings. Together, additives such as pigment dispersants, leveling agents, and defoamers have been widely used to improve the appearance and construction function of the coating. Imported HDI biuret or trimer ensures the functionality of the coating. The improved polyurethane acrylic coating has made significant progress in its functionality, but its price has decreased by a large margin compared to imported repair paints with the same functionality. Through years of exploration, it is believed that China's repair paint industry will embark on a path of development with its own characteristics. After several years of practical application, in the field of repair paint for passenger cars in China, it has completely transformed from perchloroethylene to polyurethane acrylic acid.

At present, domestic repair paint production enterprises mainly gather in Guangdong and Jiangsu provinces. Among them, domestic brands such as Guangdong's Seattle, Futian, and Yinfan, as well as Jiangsu's Fulham and Lipai, have now had a significant impact in shopping malls. The national repair paint enterprises in China, based on their professional development, research and production of car repair paint products, have seized the opportunity of the rapid development of China's car industry. Since 1997, they have been conducting independent development and have successively announced three generations of products. The color masterbatch system has also formed three types: high, medium, and low, fully satisfying the needs of different levels of domestic car repair paint shopping malls. There are over 1000 color mixing formulas that can meet the majority of the demand for repair paint colors in shopping malls. In recent years, Chinese car repair paint companies have continuously strengthened their investment in equipment, skills, and management, gradually narrowing the gap with well-known foreign brands.

The paint used for passenger car production is mainly cured at room temperature or low temperature, and a skill route similar to that of car repair paint is selected. This is the prelude to China's self-developed car repair paint.

The successful development of color masterbatch system has given birth to the car repair paint industry

The first thing to enter the car repair paint market is product paint. Around 1996, domestic repair paint malls presented fixed color product paint for domestic cars, which was welcomed by car repair shops. At that time, China had a relatively small number of sedans and a relatively single color. As long as they could produce product paints such as mulberry red, magic black, diamond silver, Indian red, and chardonnay red, they could occupy a certain market share.

Around 2000, domestic car repair paint color master system was launched in shopping malls. It should be said that this is the official entry of car repair paint in China into the shopping mall. Because the color masterbatch system is the central skill of car repair paint.

When domestic car repair paint first entered the shopping mall, it was very chaotic and confusing. The manufacturers that could produce passenger car paint all introduced repair paint. Some dilute the color paste to form a color masterbatch, while others transfer all the varnish and undercoat on passenger cars to the car repair paint. Imported repair paint is used well on passenger car production lines, but it does not mean that passenger car paint can be used as car repair paint. The appearance and other functions of sedan topcoat are necessary to be superior to those of passenger car paint. After the repair of a sedan, it is necessary for the repaired coating and the old coating to be common in terms of gloss, color, clarity, durability, and other aspects. The repair paint color master system is not a typical color paste.

To develop color masterbatch, it is necessary to handle the laxity skills of various pigments, and it is absolutely not allowed to exhibit phenomena such as blooming and floating during the color matching process. Even slight flocculation can affect the accuracy of color matching. Only by effectively handling pigment dispersion skills can a qualified repair paint masterbatch system be produced. The company has continuously developed and successfully developed a color masterbatch system, and has independent intellectual property rights.

It is also necessary to carefully select metal pigments and pearlescent pigments for both pearlescent and metallic masterbatches, using the minimum variety of masterbatches to create more car colors.

The car repair paint color master system, in addition to the color master, is necessary to have supporting software and inform customers how to use it. It includes a color masterbatch characteristic table, reference color cards, corresponding formulas, and product descriptions.

After the domestic car repair paint entered the shopping mall, it went through 2-3 years of melee and gradually got on the right track. Fake and counterfeit products have been significantly reduced, and manufacturers without the ability to produce repair paint cannot withstand complaints and claims, gradually giving up production of repair paint. After several years of survival and elimination, several major manufacturers have now taken the lead in domestic repair paint production. They not only have their own color masterbatch system, but also the various materials required for car repair are more thorough.

When the domestic car repair paint color master system was first introduced to the market, the color mixing center dared not place the domestic color master in front of the platform. Now, most color mixing centers have two sets of color master systems presented together in front of the stage, one domestically produced and one imported. During this period, several well-known domestic brand color masterbatch systems have been able to accurately modulate the colors of the vast majority of domestic and foreign sedans.

Most car repair shops also use imported and domestic products together. Some experienced spray painters can make accurate evaluations of the products used and select high-quality and reasonably priced products. As competition in the car repair paint market gradually becomes more rational, high-quality products are also gradually recognized.

With a fundamental and thorough series of products, each manufacturer places their own products in shopping malls, usually by establishing a sales network, setting up offices or agents, color mixing centers, car repair shops, and so on throughout the country. The sales system centered around the production factory has a strict management system, establishing an outstanding reputation with each other.

The manufacturer not only provides complete skill materials, but also trains skill backbone for paint mixing centers and car repair shops. With the rapid increase in the number of sedans in our country, there is a serious shortage of skilled color mixers and sprayers. Powerful sedan repair paint manufacturers bear the training task and often send personnel to the site to guide color mixing and construction, so that their color mixing centers and sedan repair shops are familiar with and master the characteristics of our company's products, and handle difficult problems in practical application. Sales personnel have close contact with agents, color mixing centers, and repair shops, and are able to provide timely information to the shopping mall, which is then transmitted to the production factory, enabling the factory to continuously improve its existing products.

Another characteristic of this stage is that domestic repair paint learns from imported brands and follows them. After being treated with pigment dispersant and dispersant resin, a high pigment content color paste and masterbatch can be obtained. For example, high pigment carbon black is a difficulty in pigment dispersion. By improving the pigment dispersion agent and resin, the content of high pigment carbon black in the color paste can reach 30% to 45% (in solid fraction), and the content of high pigment carbon black in the color masterbatch can reach 15% to 25% (in solid fraction). When the amount of carbon black in the black paint is 2% to 3%, only 10% of the dispersing agent and resin are needed in the color masterbatch, which does not affect the coating function. Due to the high concentration of pigments and the good compatibility between loose resin and other resins, high concentration color masterbatch can also be used for color mixing in plastic coatings, original car paint, and other decorative coatings.

Varnish may seem the simplest, but once you enter the door, you will feel very profound. It occupies a very important position in car repair paint. Firstly, the appearance of a sedan is significantly superior to that of a passenger car or other decorative coatings, so high clarity of the varnish is required. Secondly, sedans, especially mid to high-end sedans, need to have good polishing and scratch resistance. After repainting the entire car, there are several dirty spots on the surface that need to be polished to remove, and there is no significant difference between the polished and unpolished areas. After repairing the car, the connection between the repair and the original paint also needs to be polished. The polishing performance of a varnish is related to the composition of the resin and the crosslinking density of the coating. The scratch resistance of the coating is another important function, which is an important reason for the mid-term loss of gloss (appearing in February to May) caused by the car topcoat. It is related to the hardness of the coating, but not determined by the hardness. It is generally believed that the higher the elastic modulus and tensile strength at break, the better the scratch resistance of the coating.

The curing speed of varnish determines the repair cycle of sedans. The most widely used varnish in shopping malls is polyurethane acrylic paint, which takes more than a week to completely cure. However, for repair paint, if the coating can be polished or does not turn white after rain after leaving the factory, and does not affect its function, the owner will require the car to be driven back. After the application of general varnish, it takes at least 12 hours to leave the factory at 20 ℃, or baking at 60 ℃ for at least 1 hour. At present, the quick-drying part of the repair varnish has been presented in the shopping mall, which can be polished in an environment above 20 ℃ within 4 hours.

After several years of practice and improvement, domestic car repair paint has made significant progress compared to when it first entered the market. The market share has been increasing year by year, and it is estimated that it now accounts for more than two-thirds of the sales volume of domestic car repair paint. Without skilled progress, such a rapid growth rate is impossible.

Urgent to enter high-end shopping malls

In the car repair paint market, imported brands have great advantages in the high-end category. In addition to brand advantages, the ability and speed of color matching systems and new product development are difficult to compare with domestic repair paint. Each imported brand has tens of thousands of reference color cards and corresponding formulas for their color matching system. When car manufacturers introduce new car colors, they can obtain the color cards and quickly add them to their color card library, which is conducive to color matching in the color center. Multinational companies have strong development capabilities, and car repair paint is no exception. Every year, they can disclose numerous patents related to repair paint.

High end domestic car repair paint stores, such as 4S stores, use car repair paint to repair many high-end cars and have high requirements for paint quality. It is necessary to improve the paint quality of domestic car repair paint to meet the demand for high-end cars.

Another issue with domestic car repair paint is that the product quality is still unstable and often presents problems. The quality of the coating depends on the quality of the coating and its construction. If the quality of the coating can be guaranteed to be stable and the coating is in a pathological state during construction, we will try our best to find the cause from the construction. This mentality is common among spray painters who use imported repair paint. If domestic repair paint products can still maintain quality issues for 3-5 years, it will also build confidence in the brand for the sprayers. So, it is very important to improve the management level of domestic car repair paint manufacturers.

With the improvement of environmental regulations, higher requirements have been put forward for car repair paint, and the trend of high solid content and water-based paint cannot be avoided. It is necessary for domestic repair paint companies to strengthen skill development and innovate in learning, only in this way can they build their central competitiveness.

Article source: Guangdong Automotive Repair Painthttp://www.jinliangxincai.com/