Primer for Copper

Hi

A quick question... which of the following would be best as a first paint coat onto oxidised bare copper water pipes?

household oil undercoat red oxide primer modeller's enamels smoothrite acrylic emulsion

1 coat marine paint - think its International polyurethane, not sure

There's HCl on site for a quick etch, if that would help, but I doubt I'll have time to go buy more paints.

thanks, NT

Reply to
NT
Loading thread data ...

I have always managed to get pipes covered by emulsion while painting the walls. :-)

Works just fine in my experience - but cold water pipes can still corrode a bit if subject to prolonged condensation. In that case, out of your list, I'd stick with emulsion but take extra care to undercoat and topcoat carefully.

Of course, clean thoroughly to get rid of any flux, grease or wax before any paint.

Reply to
Rod

Not emulsion. Did the bare copper pipes in the boiler room with emulsion, there is a definite green tinge showing through, this appeared within hours if not minutes... Mind I didn't bother with any cleaning of the pipes other than removing any dust or verdigris from left over flux. (The plumber who did this place before our time was at the lower end of the skill and quality scale).

On that basis go for something oil based, bear in mind a cold water pipe may well get condensation on it.

Reply to
Dave Liquorice

I would be inclined to clean it up with a Scotchbrite pad and then paint it directly with oil-based gloss. No primer, no undercoat.

formatting link

Reply to
Dave Osborne

Depends what paint finish. Copper doesn't need a primer for normal decorative painting. I usually paint pipes with gloss paint - the gloss surface reflection tends to make the pipe look smaller than when painted matt. With gloss paint, depending on the colour, much of the opacity is in the undercoat, and you may need two undercoats to cover a black pipe with white gloss. (This is true of the high volatiles ones - I've managed to avoid the low volatiles ones so far, so I can't comment on those.)

Reply to
Andrew Gabriel

Thanks everyone. As it turns out I didnt get as far as painting the pipes. When I do I'll use the oil based.

BTW is there any risk of oil paints disappearing thanks to the green agenda?

NT

Reply to
NT

Yes, the oil paints you used to use are no longer manufactured since January, although I got the bloke at the trade counter to search and he found the odd tin still on the shelf. If you want one, look for a tin without the low volatiles flash on it. All the DIY outlets seemed to get rid of their stock in Sales some months ago, so it would probably have to be a trade counter.

Reply to
Andrew Gabriel

i want to coat copper piping of the chiller to avoid the environmental effects of ash and sulfur contents in the atmosphere. what should I use. Just RED OXIDE or some other enamel base primer is recommended ?

Reply to
muntazir5

I've always applied gloss top coat straight to the bare copper.

Reply to
charles

I painted the copper tails to the SS towel rail in the bathroom with Plasi-Kote 'chrome' enamel. Looks more like brushed SS, but has lasted well. Just cleaned the pipes and painted it straight on.

But all the other copper pipes in the house seem to last OK left bare. ;-)

Reply to
Dave Plowman (News)

Red Oxide, can one still get this?When I wanted some they said some stuff called engenamel was the closest we are allowed to sell, and it needs to be baked on. Brian

Reply to
Brian Gaff

Not enough information. Copper doesn't normally need any protection from environmental effects. Protection from corrosion in contact with cements (particularly high sulfer concrete) is done by using PVC-coated copper tubing or spacing the copper away from the concrete surface. (The PVC will need protection from sunlight in exposed positions.)

If you want a primer to form a long-lasting binder for other paint layers which helps resist rubbing paint off, you will need an acid-etch primer on copper (usually sold for copper and aluminium priming - i.e. metals which form a stable protecting oxide layer in air).

Red Oxide primers are normally used for resisting corrosion of steal in a way copper doesn't need protecting (i.e. an unstable oxide layer, because the oxide is larger and flakes away to expose new metal).

Reply to
Andrew Gabriel

HomeOwnersHub website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.