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Automotive Coatings

Coatings Effect Pigments preview Application by Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany

COLOR – AN INHERENT PART OF CAR DESIGN

Our colors and effects reflect identity, evoke emotions and shape perceptions. Imagine a bold red that promises speed, an extravagant gold reflecting elegance and style, a tech-metallic white that enhances body shapes or a powerful green that turns any car into an instant classic. Customers buy cars not only for rational reasons, but also with their hearts. Our world-leading effect pigments support all your exterior automotive formulation ideas. And beyond.

Enduring color brilliance and performance

Environmental factors challenge automotive coatings in multiple ways: wind, weather, sand, snow and storms leave their mark, as do car washes and the sun’s effects. With their tested & proven additional surface treatment, our proprietary range of weather-resistant pigments can deliver what the modern automotive industry needs: lasting brilliance and color constancy.

These pigments satisfy the most rigorous technical requirements. For our pigment experts, technical support is an important issue. Our global production locations and regional centers of Technical Excellence ensure peace of mind in quality and delivery and expert support in regulatory, sustainability and application topics. Our local teams on all continents talk your language and support your formulations.

Leaving no mark

Automotive refinish coatings must endure a true marathon for quality and reliability – we have run it for over 50 years already.

The principal characteristics of high-quality automotive repair coatings include their ability to permanently retain their color and good looks. Even tiny deviations in color can cause a repair coating to be less than satisfactory. Our weather-treated effect pigments ensure long-term color fidelity and quality as well as maximum reproducibility.

Biflair® - Silky silver luster effect pigments

EXTERIOR EFFECT PIGMENTS

Brilliant, durable, weather-resistant automotive and transportation coatings make for eye-catching exteriors, and are protected by our surface-modifying functional solutions.

Our wide and deep portfolio of weather-stable effect pigments opens infinite possibilities in automotive design. From popular platform colors to niche specialty cars – with our effect pigments your stylings wins the show.

High performance for extreme exterior conditions
High chroma effect pigments for strong and deep colors
Living sparkle® effects to add surprise and power to coatings
Best batch-to-batch consistency for uniform application

INTERIOR EFFECT PIGMENTS

Extend your design philosophy to the car's interior. Our effect pigments bring beauty and functionality to your interior design language – solutions for a clean and stylish appearance.

Effect pigments for interior applications have a wide range of uses and advantages:

Plastic coatings, leather coatings, mass-colored plastics and printed in-mold decoration
Best batch-to-batch consistency for our portfolios with and without surface treatment
High performance for extreme performance requirements
The same pigments can be used both inside and outside and in different materials (coatings, plastics, printed film)

ANTI-SCRATCH PIGMENTS

Scratches are a curse and damage the value of a car. Our anti-scratch solutions protect the beauty and style of your precious car surfaces. Binders in protective coatings can make such a difference. Rely on top performance from our Polysilazanes solutions, branded as Durazane®.

EMPOWERING SURFACES WITH DURAZANE®

Polysilazanes strongly improve the durability of surfaces. An entirely new class of coating binders, they're powerful providers of protection with a plus, offering unique properties that keep surfaces looking and feeling perfect in a variety of premium-value applications. Coatings with Durazane® result in durable surfaces that not only gleam as if they were brand new but also protect against all kinds of damage to preserve their beauty and value.

DIVE INTO OUR COATINGS' WORLD

Experience Digital Colors
Effect pigments are going digital. Learn how colors and effects come to light on 2D and 3D objects, like panels and car shapes. Move the light source to discover the full secrets of stylings, with their unique sparkle, highlights and color travel effects. Experience how your favorite color translates from a panel to our sportive M-One car, resting in its garage or out on the road.
Library of Inspirations & Formulations | Surface Solutions eShop
Library of Inspirations & Formulations
Black & Grey Shades
Find inspiration for your light to dark grey, silver, anthracite or black project areas.
Blue & Green Shades
Find inspiration for the whole Blue to Green color area: from blue to bluegreen, turquoise to green colors.
Styling Impulse | Surface Solutions eShop
Looking for new & trending inspiration in the Coating industry? Check out our Styling Impulse, updated on a bi-monthly base, you will always find something worth your time!
The MBOX
With our latest format of the MBOX we like to discuss the future with you. 3 stories are creating the framework of future aesthetics. Our pigments and functionals will showcase CMF design ideas from various areas such as product design, packaging and automotive. We will take you on a journey of about 60 samples that are addressing ideas on how to materialize the future. Within the presentation we will be travelling between the physical and digital world. We are super excited to have fruitful conversations with your creative and technical teams.
White & Pastel Shades
Find inspiration for your white or lightly colored and pastel colors.
Yellow & Red Shades
Find inspiration for the whole Red to Yellow color area: from red to magenta, orange, gold, yellow to beige colors.
Instrumental Color Release
Data driven technologies are moving forward at top speed: we, as a quality leader offer a new digitized color release process for the global QC of pearlescent pigments. Highly reliable color data will replace the perception of the human eye. How? Instrumental color data have been correlated with visual evaluations to derive instrumental specifications based on the DIN99o formula.
Pigments for Radar-Transparent Coatings
We have an extensive portfolio of effect pigments that are suitable for Radar Coatings. Especially our range of Iriodin® pigments enables non-metallic stylings with a bright aluminum look - without using aluminum pigments, which is a pre-requisite for the safe functioning of Radar equipment.