Primers

Primers

— primers are special compositions designed for the preliminary treatment of various surfaces. Primers themselves are not complete coatings—they only prepare walls, ceilings, floors, etc., for the application of another coating. It should be noted that such treatment is used not only for painting: plastering, puttying, tiling, wallpapering, etc., also almost invariably require the preliminary application of a primer. This treatment performs three main functions. First of all, it should be noted that the initially treated base is often rough; due to such roughness, adhesion with the applied paint or other coatings without primer is very low, which, to put it mildly, does not contribute to durability. The primer fills in the irregularities, creating a continuous film on the surface that provides high adhesion rates. Secondly, the primer acts as a kind of glue, strengthening the base surface and preventing it from crumbling and cracking, which is also important for the quality retention of various coatings. Thirdly, such compositions provide additional protection of the base from moisture and other adverse effects. Compositions of this type can have different specializations and application features. However, there are two main types of classic primers: universal deep penetration primers and surface adhesion compositions like "betonokontakt." The first type can be used on bases with a high tendency to absorb, such as brick or loose plaster (although it is also suitable for concrete). It provides not only good adhesive properties but also reduces hygroscopicity. In turn, betonokontakt, as the name suggests, is primarily intended for concrete and other low-absorbent surfaces (such as old paint); usually, acrylic acts as the binding agent in such compositions. Additionally, it is worth mentioning another specific type of primer—"paint-primers." These compositions combine primer and paint and allow surfaces to be treated in one pass. Thanks to this, such paint can be applied without additional coatings—in simple terms, "it is its own primer." This significantly saves both effort and time—there is no need to paint the treated surface in two passes and wait for the primer to dry before applying the paint. For several reasons, one of the most popular areas of application for such compositions is painting metal surfaces; in light of this, a rust solvent may also be added to the composition, improving the quality of treatment and the overall condition of the surface. Nevertheless, even such primers are not "all-powerful," and particularly thick rust should still preferably be brushed off beforehand. It should be noted that such "2 in 1" compositions are often colloquially referred to as primer-enamels, but in our catalog, slightly different terminology is used; for more details, see "Binding Base—Primer-Enamel."