Exterior white paint

[Jim Hawkins]

What sort of paint is used to make the white traffic markings on roads and in car parks ? It seems good stuff. Is it available commercially ?

Jim Hawkins

[Martin Bonner]

I've just googled for "white road marking paint" and found lots.

The stuff actually used on roads isn't really a paint, it's a solid material which is melted, applied as a liquid, and then freezes. You can get pre-cut strips which you lay on the surface and then melt with a blowtorch. (The magic phrase is "thermoplastic".)

[Nightjar]

A variety of different types from one supplier. Other suppliers are available:

The most durable:

The easiest to apply:

Chlorinated rubber paints:

Acrylic paint:

Colin Bignell

[Jim Hawkins]

Thanks for that Colin. There was a time when you could get textured exterior paints that were both reasonably thixotropic and which contained anti-fungal additives too. A search of my local B&Q (both by me and a B&Q salesperson) failed to yield a single example of that type. What it did reveal was an unbelievable hotch-potch of paints, with no attempt at division into interior and exterior, surface finishes - or any other property. Many had brief, vague descriptions with little indication of their content or intended application.

Jim Hawkins

[Martin Brown]

Specialist masonry paints but you won't find them in a shed.

One tip is avoid any paints that have their instructions in too many different languages - in particular southern European ones. The best paint formulation varies with latitude and anything sold over too wide a geographic area has to be a compromise. The new generation of solvent free water based exterior paints don't last anything like as well as the old oil based ones no matter how carefully they are applied.

[Dave Liquorice]

No Dulux Weathershield Exterior Masonry Paint (smooth or textured)? I think that has anti fungal additive and is pretty damn tough stuff when dry/cured. I was surprised when a wire brush hardly scratched the surface when cleaning up a bit of stone around where a patch hadn't adhered.

Sandtex is another masonry paint that I'd expect to find in the sheds.

I may have used the "trade" Weathershield rather than retail, what is your application?

[stuart noble]

Bondaglass Voss used to make the white paint used for the lines on the edge of London Underground platforms. I imagine durability and fast drying were the main criteria, so probably a urethane of some kind. Amazingly they still don't have a website, but they do make exceedingly fine paints

[Nightjar]

I rather doubt that road marking paint is a viable alternative. Watco also do exterior wall paints, although they are aimed at the industrial sector and, like all Watco products, are not the cheapest:

Sandtex has long been my preferred exterior paint. Both B&Q and Homebase are listed as stockists on the Sandtex website, although, looking at my local area, not every store of each is included.

Colin Bignell

[D.M.Chapman]

It's not really paint - it's melted and put down, and sets almost instantly.

I used to know someone who described himself as a "thermoplastic application engineer". He "painted" white lines in carparks...

Darren

[Brian Gaff]

Its very thick, usually not so much paint as some kind of thick goo, at least it looked that way to me some time back when I could see it. Brian

[Brian Gaff]

ah yes, kind of like a glue gun approach. Brian

[John Williamson]

As others have said, it's a thermoplastic compound, often with glass beads mixed in to make it retroreflective.

In France and across most of mainland Europe, they just seem to use the cheapest nastiest paint they can find, so all trace of the markings disappears at night in the rain. It only lasts a few months before it disappears entirely in the dry, too.

[polygonum]

And isn't it wonderful when you reach a complex junction with almost entirely worn out yellow box, white lines, red lines, all covered with rain, in the dark. And the lighting seems to highlight the layout which was there many years ago and miss the current one...

I seem to remember many roads in the UK had wonderful, really bright white lines even under the relatively crappy headlamps of the day. So few now are ever as good.