Wetting Agents and Surface Modifiers

With wetting, flow and leveling or slip agents for water-based and non-aqueous coatings, we can provide solutions for virtually any paint, coating and ink system. Our broad technology portfolio includes polymeric, oligomeric and surfactant-based products such as slip agents with very good recoatability and wetting properties or polymeric flow and leveling agents that offer excellent intercoat adhesion. Formulators value wetting agents and surface modifiers from BASF for high efficiency, allowing dosage reduction, and universal suitability.

Excellent flow and reduced surface tension
One of the strengths of our range is a class of very versatile interfacially active additives, fluorinated polyacrylates. These flow and leveling agents offer significant advantages over pure polyacrylates. While straight polyacrylate copolymers feature good flow performance, although they do not sufficiently reduce the surface tension of a formulation to solve problems like cratering or poor substrate wetting. In contrast, polyacrylates with fluorinated side chains can lower surface tension for excellent flow and leveling combined with anti-cratering and good wetting behavior.

Fluorocarbon-modified polyacrylates also outperform organomodified silicones in terms of flow, substrate wetting and fisheye resistance. On the other hand, polysiloxanes can provide strong surface-slip and anti-blocking effects as well as surface tension reduction.

Practical Guides for BASF Wetting Agents and Surface Modifiers