3rd International Conference on Material, Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering (IC3ME 2015)

Curing Properties of Water-based Self-drying / Fast-drying

Foundry Coating
Chunyi ZHAN1, a *, Shengshan FENG1, b, Shuzhong XIE2, Chunjing LIU2,
Jiahao LIANG2 and Yunhua GAO2
1
School of mechanical and Electrical Engineering, Guangdong Institute of Science and Technology,
Zhuhai, 519090, China
2
Zhuhai Doumen Fulian Molding Materials Industry Co.Ltd, Zhuhai, 519180, China
a
email: richardzhan@hotmail.com, bemail: fss8172@126.com

Keywords: Water-based; Self-drying; Coating; Curing

Abstract:The article focuses on the self-drying curing characteristics of energy-saving and
environmental friendly water-based self-drying / fast-drying foundry coating. Through check
experiment, the differences of strength, humidity resistance and influence on the strength of resin
sand when respectively using new water-based foundry coating, common water-based and
alcohol-based coating are compared and studied. The results show that the coating strength of new
water-based coating is significantly higher than that of common water-based coating and is almost
the same as alcohol-based coating. The coating has a minimal impact on the strength of resin sand,
and its humidity resistance is obviously better than that of common water-based and alcohol-based
coating, for the residual water content of the coating is only about 1.4% after self-drying.

Introduction
Water-based self-drying / fast-drying foundry coating has the advantages of being safe,
convenient in transportation, low cost, and contamination-free. It also has good suspension property
and brushability, and fast air drying speed etc. It overcomes the problems of alcohol-based coating
such as inflammability, explosibility, poisonousness, and suspension stability. It doesn’t leave
serious brush marks when brushing or have the problems of common water-based coating such as
needing to dry, being difficult to dry, and easy to absorb moisture, etc. [1-6]. From the point of view
of energy saving and consumption reducing, improving working conditions as well as production
safety along with surface quality of castings and so on, water-based self-drying / fast-drying coating
is the developing direction of sand casting coating.
The new water-based self-drying / fast-drying foundry coating is developed by using the natural
refractory material without calcination or electric melting as base material and self-made normal
temperative cured modified polymer emulsion organic adhesive as main self-drying / low
temperature fast drying adhesive at room temperature as well as applying the fast-drying silicate
adhesive as main high temperature adhesive. It has good brushability and low permeability under
the condition of high viscosity and solid content (volatile content). It can also be fast drying at low
drying temperature in a short time, or be fast surface drying using torch, gas, oxygen acetylene gas
or hot blast short time rapid surface drying. Besides, this coating can be fast natural drying under
the condition of high ambient temperature, low humidity and good ventilation conditions without
worsening the sand strength. The dried coating has good moisture resistant absorption ability, which
provides good conditions for foundry enterprises to save energy and improve environmental
conditions and the quality of casting.

Test instruments and methods

Self-drying time（h）
Self-drying time of coatings is measured by QGZ type paint film drying time tester under the
condition of 25˚C and 80% RH, which characterizes drying speed of the coatings. The coatings,

© 2015. The authors - Published by Atlantis Press 1984

which are 0.5mm thick, are placed on the planar basement of resin sand.
Wear loss
The wear loss of coatings is the characterization value of wear resistance of coatings and it
characterizes the cohesive strength of coatings indirectly.
The wear loss of coatings is tested using JM-IV type paint film abrasion tester. The sample is a
resin sand plate with a diameter of 105 mm and thickness of 10 mm. The coatings, with the
thickness of 1.0～1.5 mm, are thoroughly dried and tested on 750g load and 60r friction with
grinding wheel. The quality difference of the coated circular plate before and after the test is the
wear loss of coatings.
We adopt the "relative-strength" characterization when using the wear loss of coatings to
compare the difference and the change of the coating strength. Suppose the relative strength of
reference sample is one and the wear loss of it is A0, while the wear loss of others is Ax, then the
relative strength of some sample is Rx= A0/Ax.
Water content
The coating’s water is measured by double disc infrared dryer and precision balance. And the
surface heating temperature of the bearing sample plate is 140~220˚C.

Test results and analysis

Self-drying curing characteristics of coating
Foundry coating should not only have certain strength at room temperature, but also good
strength at high temperature. According to such demand, we develop a curable modified polymer
emulsion at room temperature as the main self-drying / low temperature quick drying adhesive. At
the same time, we used a fast-drying type inorganic binder as the main high temperature adhesive,
with the addition of the corresponding latent type hardener.
1.6
relative strength

1.2

0.8

0.4

0
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
self-drying time of coatings/d

Fig.1. The self-drying curing characteristics of water-based self-drying coatings

Figure 1 shows how the strength of the new water-based self-drying coatings grows and changes
over time, which demonstrates its self-drying curing characteristics. The process can be divided into
the following four stages:
①initial dehydration-transformation stage
When water-based self-drying coating is applied under normal temperature, normal atmospheric
pressure and open environment conditions of foundry production, as the contact surface area of the
coating and the air increases significantly, the partial pressure difference of water and the curing
agent on both sides of the interface makes the coating’s water (including coating’s diluent water and
free water in binder) and latent curing agent (volatile lye) in the modified polymer emulsion binder
evaporate. The air flow of a certain temperature can further promote the evaporation of water and
the latent type curing agent, so that the coating begins to show signs of dehydration, and at the same
time changes from alkaline to neutral and acidic without curing. At this stage, coating’s strength has
not been established yet. The time is about 10~30min.
②middle physical-chemical common curing stage
As its storage time increases, the coating continues to dehydrate. The polymer in the modified

1985
polymer emulsion is closed packed and physical hardening occurs. Under aluminum ion hydrolysis
and capillarity of water insoluble organic fiber, free water in the fast-drying inorganic binder
rapidly evaporates and loses, which causes inorganic binder to begin solidifing, and physical
hardening also occurs. At the same time, the modified polymer emulsion decreases the critical
concentration of gelation of inorganic binder thus induces the fast concentration of gelation,
accelerating its physical hardening. Meanwhile, the coating has changed into acid, the zinc ions in
the modified polymer emulsion gradually dissociate out of their complexes and interact with
carboxyl anions on emulsion polymer linear molecular chain, thus water insoluble complexes is
formed and polymer chain crosslinking is realized. Network structure polymer which does not
dissolve in water is formed, leading to the chemical curing of coating. At this stage, physical
hardening and chemical hardening occur simultaneously, and the strength increases rapidly. The
time is about 30min ~3h. The end point of this stage is the end point of self-drying time which is
tested by paint film drying time tester. Now dehydration curing is completed (relative strength is set
to 1). The initial and middle stage of the self - drying process is the self-drying time which is tested
by paint film drying time tester.
③later chemical curing stage
As the coating’s storage time continuously increases, physical curing of the coating is no longer
happening, but the chemical curing of the modified polymer emulsion continues to exist and the
strength peaks. This is the late self-drying process of the water-based self-drying coating. The time
is about 3h ~1d.
④storage moisture absorption stage
If the coating is kept in storage under normal temperature, normal atmospheric pressure, and
open environment conditions of casting production, it will start to react with moisture absorption,
which leads to the reduction of coating’s strength. The time is 1d ~7d. It reduces to the level of
critical end point of self - drying time after seven days.
Residual moisture after the coating’s self-drying
There are three forms of moisture in the coatings: one is free water, it is completely lost before
heating to around 110˚C; the second is absorbed water, it is lost when heating to 140˚C~220˚C; the
third is structural water, it is lost when heating to 400˚C~700˚C. In the drying process of
water-based self-drying coating, most of the free water can be removed, but the absorbed water and
structural water can not be removed.
If there is a lot of residual moisture after the drying of water-based self-drying coating, the gas of
coating will become big, which makes it difficult to prevent the gas hole defect of casting.
Therefore, we tested the changes of water content (including free water and most of the absorbed
water) and the relative strength during the drying process of water-based self-drying coating, the
preparation and self-drying conditions of the coating are both 28~29˚C and 47~49%RH, as shown
in figure 2.The measured self-drying time of the coating is 61 minutes.
It can be seen from figure 2:
①The residual moisture no longer reduces after the coating’s self-drying, and it always remains
at 1.4%, but the abrasion loss continues to decrease. It proves that the chemical curing reaction is
still ongoing after the dehydration of physical curing of the water-based self-drying coating is
finished.
②The experiment proves that the self-drying time, which is tested using QGZ type paint film
drying time tester, accurately indicates the characteristic time point that the residual moisture no
longer decreases (dehydration and curing are completed), it cannot indicate the characteristic time
point that coating strength peaks. However, the self-drying time of the coating can be used as the
characterization value of the curing speed of the coating, it reflects the relative level of the coating’s
curing speed.
③The residual moisture ( mainly composed of water) is only about 1.4% after the coating’s
self-drying. It has very little impact on the total gas of coating and provides a good condition for
preventing the gas hole defect of casting.

1986
 30 1.2

coating's moisture content/%

25 1

relative strength
20 0.8
coating's moisture content
15 0.6
relative strength
10 0.4

5 0.2

0 0
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
storage time after preparation of coating/min

Fig.2. Variation of moisture content and relative strength of water-based self-drying coating in
the drying process
Humidity resistance of coating
When the cured coating is stored, the coating may absorb moist if the humidity is high, and leads
to the reduction of coating’s strength and increase the amount of gas evolution from the coating.
In order to analyze the humidity resistance of this coating, we tested the variation of wear loss
and relative strength of water-based self-drying coating 、 common water-based coating and
alcohol-based coating under the same storage conditions (9~12˚C, 38~51%RH), as shown in figure
3.
2 1.6 wear loss of water-based self-
drying coating/g
1.4
1.5 wear loss of common water-based
relative strength
wear loss/ cm3

1.2 coating/g

1 1 wear loss of alcohol-based

coating/g
0.8
relative strength of water-based
0.5
0.6 self-drying coating
relative strength of common water-
0 0.4
based coating
0 2 4 6 8
relative strength of alcohol-based
storage time after curing of coating/d coating
Fig.3. Variation of wear loss and relative strength of the three coatings on self-drying time of
water-based self-drying coating after storage
It can be seen intuitively from figure 3：
①After the storage of common water-based coating and alcohol-based coating, their strengths
are always falling, both strengths have fallen by about 30 percent. In the early period, as the curing
reaction continues, the strength of the water-based self-drying coating improves significantly to
about 40 percent during the seven days of natural storage under room temperature. Subsequently
due to the moisture absorption reaction of coating, its strength also decreases in the late stage, but it
is always higher than the initial strength during the first seven days of observation period.
②The self-drying strength of water-based self-drying coating is equivalent to the combustion
curing strength of the on-sale alcohol-based coating, but it is several times higher than dry strength
of the on-sale common water-based coating.
Therefore, the humidity resistance of water-based self-drying coating is significantly better than
that of common water-based coating and alcohol-based coating; the strength of water-based
self-drying coating is significantly higher than that of common water-based coating and is
equivalent to that of alcohol-based coating.
The effect of coating on strength of resin sand
In order to compare the effect of water-based self-drying coating, common water-based coating
and alcohol-based coating on the strength of resin sand, we dipped coating single-side three kinds of
1987
coating (for 5s) in 8-shaped standard specimens (grain size is all 50/100 mesh) of acid
self-hardening furan resin sand, after the coating was dried in a corresponding way (water-based
self-drying coating was dried under the conditions of 23~30˚C and 28~38%RH, began timing and
testing after three hours; common water-based coating began timing and testing after drying at
120˚C for one hour and then cooled to room temperature; alcohol-based began timing and testing
after immediate kindling and drying and then cooled to room temperature,) the tensile strength of
8-shaped standard specimens of resin sand after different time intervals under the same conditions
(9~12˚C、38~51%RH) were compared and tested, as shown in figure 4.
tensile strength of resin sand sample /

1.8
1.6
1.4
1.2 alcohol-based coating
1 water-based self-drying/
MPa

0.8 fast-drying coating

common water-based
0.6
coating
0.4 no coating
0.2
0
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 22 24 26
storage time/ h

Fig.4. The effect of three coatings on tensile strength of resin sand

From the analysis of the table and figure it can be known:
①Alcohol-based coating influences the strength of resin sand most and significantly reduces the
strength of resin sand. After storing for 24 hours, strength loss rate of coated alcohol-based coating
reaches 38% compared with the non-coated resin sand sample, the loss rate of curing initial strength
of the alcohol-based coating also reaches 31% compared with the coated alcohol-based resin sand
sample. The reason is that the solvent of the alcohol-based coating are methanol, ethanol and
isopropanol, and they are all organic solvents; the residual organic solvent in resin sand is easy to
make partial not fully cured resin film dissolved, meanwhile, the humidity resistance of the
alcohol-based coating is poor, which leads to the significant decrease of the strength of resin sand.
②Because the common water-based coating is heated drying and curing, when the coating is
heated and dried, it also makes the resin film of the resin sand which has not yet fully cured get
further polymerization and strengthening, the strength of resin sand is significantly improved. But
the binder of common water-based coating is general water-soluble inorganic binder. It is easy to
absorb moisture and lose strength during storage after curing, the hygroscopicity of coating is
strong, it is difficult to prevent the moisture from penetrating the internal of resin sand, and leads to
dramatic decline of strength of both coating and resin sand; after storing for 24 hours, strength loss
rate of heating and curing initial strength reaches 41% compared with the coated common
water-based resin sand sample.
③Because the viscosity of water-based self-drying coating is high, the permeability of resin sand
is low after dip coating, which makes the dissolution of water to resin film weak; after dip coating
about three hours, the coating has been basically cured and gets higher strength, which makes the
whole strength of resin sand sample add about 18% compared with the non-coated resin sample;
after storing for 24 hours, because the humidity resistance of water-based self-drying coating is
good (the reason is that the modified styrene-acrylic emulsion bond film in water-based self-drying
coating has strong humidity resistance), loss rate of the initial strength of the 3 hours self-curing is
24% compared with the coated water-based self-drying resin sand sample, strength loss rate is only
9% compared with the non-coated resin sand sample.
Therefore, the influence of water-based self-drying coating on the strength of resin sand is the
smallest in the three coatings.

1988
Conclusion
The curing mechanism of new water-based self-drying / fast-drying coating is the interaction of
the following two kinds of reactions: one is the physical hardening caused by water evaporation loss,
and the other is the chemical hardening after the acidic change of system. The self-drying curing
process can be divided into the following three stages: initial dehydration-transformation stage、
middle physical-chemical common curing stage and later chemical curing stage. Under the
conditions of 25˚C and 80% RH, the coating can basically achieve natural drying within 1~3H; its
self-drying speed reaches international standards of similar products.
The residual water content of new water-based self-drying / fast-drying coating is only about
1.4% , which provides good conditions for avoiding the blowhole defects of castings.
The strength of new water-based self-drying / fast-drying coating is significantly higher than that
of common water-based coating and is almost the same as the alcohol-based coating. The effect on
the strength of resin sand is the smallest among the three coatings.
The humidity resistance of new water-based self-drying / fast-drying coating is obviously better
than that of common water-based and alcohol-based coatings.

Acknowledgement
In this paper, the research was sponsored by the Science and Technology Research and High-tech
Industrialization Projects of Zhuhai City, Guangdong Province,China (Project No.
2011B020102013).

References
[1] Feng Sheng-shan, Xie Shu-zhong, Liu Chun-jing, et al. Technological properties of water-based
self-drying / fast-drying foundry coating. China Foundry week Symposium(2014) 216-219
[2] Liu Sheng-yin, Sun Xing-hua, Jin Xiao-chun, et al. Development the Water-based coating for
cold box process. China Foundry week Symposium(2008) 351-357
[3] Liu Cheng-yao. Property and Application on PVA Water-Based Air-Dried Coating. Foundry, 3
(1990) 23-27.
[4] Wei Zhao-lian, Cao Li-hong. Study on Phosphate No-bake Moldcoating. Journal of Wuhan
Institute of Technology, 4 (1992) 40-46.
[5] Wei Zhao-lian, Cao Li-hong. The High Temperature Properties of Phosphate No-bake
Moldcoatings. Special Casting & Nonferrous Alloys, 5 (1994) 17-20.
[6] Hu You-fu. Production Test of JZ-1 Water-based Fast-drying Coatings．Auto Mobile Science &
Technology, 3 (1993) 23-28.

1989