Light Stabilizer for Transparent Colored Coatings on Carbon Fiber Composite Materials

Everlight Chemical has brought out a light stabilizer specifically for carbon fiber composite transparent colored coatings, fully protecting colored carbon fiber products to help them retain bright and attractive colors!

 

 

Both lightweight and stylish personalized products—colored carbon fiber

 

Carbon fiber boasts a high degree of stiffness, strength, light weight, plus outstanding properties such as resistance to chemicals and high temperatures. It finds application in many fields such as aerospace, automobiles, wind power, and medical care. In 2022, Everlight Chemical launched the Eversorb® light stabilizer CP1 and CP2 light stabilizers for use with carbon fiber composite coatings (reference article: Innovative Weatherability Solution for Carbon Fiber Materials—Light Stabilizer for CFRP Coatings). They are able to effectively improve the weather resistance of clear coatings and solve the problems of fading and peeling on the surface coatings of carbon fiber products, thereby prolonging the service lives of carbon fiber products and raising their values.

 

With the vigorous development of carbon fiber products, product suppliers keep considering how to satisfy consumer demands for more diverse, modish, and personalized products. In addition to the original black texture, it is also possible to apply the industrial art of surface spraying to create different colors and textures by using the transparent colored coatings. Red, in particular, is a very popular clear coating color because red is a color that often gives people the impression of enthusiasm, confidence and energy. Many well-known high-end sports cars and bicycle brands have introduced red products, and these have also become very popular among consumers.

 

red carbon fiber sports cars：https://www.supercars.net/blog/the-multi-million-apollo-ie-red-dragon/

 

colored carbon fiber bicycle：https://distributor.timebicycles.com/products/adhx

 

Colored carbon fiber is more prone to fading and peeling than black carbon fiber!

 

Though clear coating sprayed on carbon fiber surface can bring a novel and colorful appearance to the product, the molecular structure of the coloring in the coating is easily damaged by ultraviolet rays, making it inferior to colorless clear coating in ultraviolet tolerance. Thus, after being exposed to sunlight for long periods, colored carbon fiber products will suffer more obvious discoloration than black carbon fiber products. If that happens to a high-performance sports car, the top-of-the-line supercar would no longer be so eye-catching when its coating peels and falls off! At the same time, consumers would also be concerned about product quality, and their doubts would have a serious impact on brand reputation!

 

 

Eversorb® CP3, light stabilizer for CFRP transparent colored coatings, protects high-end cars from peeling exteriors

 

Everlight Chemical is intimately familiar with the trigger points of various carbon fiber composite coatings. That's why, in response to recent market and industry needs, we've brought out Eversorb® CP3 for carbon fiber composite transparent colored coatings, as it can effectively slow down the problems of photo-degradation and discoloration of coating layers after exposure to sunlight.

 

 

The graph below shows the result of the test where the artificially accelerated aging (ASTM G155-1) method was applied to test chromatic aberration, having the test samples continuously irradiated with a xenon lamp. After 600 hours, the test samples coated with clear red coating without light stabilizer added began to peel and fade, whereas the appearance of the test sample with 3% of Eversorb® CP3 added didn’t see significant change. After a longer testing time of 1,800 hours, it could be observed that the test sample without light stabilizer manifested very obvious chromatic change as its red coloring had almost disappeared. Comparatively, the test sample with 3% of Eversorb® CP3 added, saw a chromatic change value at 4.7 after such long-term UV exposure, still able to perfectly maintain attractive red appearance.

 

 

 

Next, we used “ASTM Adhesion Test” to test coating adhesion. After 600 hours of artificially accelerated aging (ASTM G 155-1 Test), the classification of the test sample without light stabilizer added rapidly dropped from 5B to 3B, with the coating layer gradually peeling off. As the accelerated aging time reached 1,000 hours, its classification dropped to 0B, and the coating on the test sample almost fell off and could not be attached. Comparatively, the test sample with Eversorb® CP3 added still perfectly maintained a classification of 5B even after up to 1,800 hours of accelerated aging, effectively improving the adhesion of the red clear coating and enabling the colored carbon fiber product to continually retain its bright colors and excellent stability under bright sunshine.

 

 

 

Carbon fiber composite materials offer superior functionality. With technological advancements and developments, products sprayed with coatings of different colors have been successively introduced in addition to the original transparent style coating, thereby bringing consumers more choices.

 

Everlight Chemical proactively meets with market and industry needs, continuing to develop the Eversorb® CP3 series of light stabilizer products. In addition to CP1 and CP2 which are intended for use with clear coatings on carbon fiber composite materials, we have brought out our latest product, CP3, specifically developed for clear colored coatings. This product provides exceptionally good weather protection for coating layers, providing the beautiful and novel appearances of carbon fiber composites with comprehensive safeguarding! If you wish to find out more, please do not hesitate to contact us. 

 

 

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