What's in Paint?

Generally a typical house paint is made up of three basic components: the Binder, the Pigment and the Solvent.   

Pigments are made up of minutely sized particles, which can remain suspended in a liquid base for extend periods of time. The pigment also gives the paint its coverage properties and its ability to provide ultra violet protection.

The binder is like a glue which holds everything in the paint (including the pigments) together, giving the paint its ability to bond and endure the elements.

A liquid called the solvent is used in combination with the pigment and the binder to provide the proper consistency to the paint. A solvent is basically a thinning agent. Sometimes the solvent, combined with the resin, are considered a single component of the paint.

Most modern paint will contain compounds or other substances that add particular properties to the paint such as plasticizer and drying accelerators. 

Latex

The first latex paints used natural latex as a resin. The resin in latex today may be an acrylic or some type of synthetic substance. If you have ever been concerned about latex allergies, you shouldn’t have to worry about the modern day latex paints.

The solvent in latex paint consists mostly of water with additives to help the paint components coalesce. The pigments used in latex are often made of the same materials used in alkyd or oil based paints. Other additives may be used to provide special characteristics to the paint.

There have been so many developments in this industry that we won't attempt to specify what technically qualifies as a modern latex paint. Paint having the practical characteristics of latex paint is usually labeled as latex , but sometimes the manufacturer feels it is better to just categorize the paint without the term latex on the label. These paints and stains will usually carry the terms acrylic or waterborne in their description.

Oil And Alkyd

Natural oil-based paints were very common decades ago, but have since been being replaced by alkyd paints. The resins of oil based paints were commonly natural products such as linseed oil or tung oil. The solvent would probably consist of mainly turpentine.

Alkyd paints consist of a synthetic type of resin called “alkyd” and probably mineral spirits as a solvent. The alkyd paint is generally recommended for more types of surfaces than the natural oil-based paints are.

You can still find paints today labeled as oil-based, but they may consist of other alkyd type ingredients combined with the linseed oil to give the paint alkyd-like qualities.

As with most materials today, so many recent developments have taken place in the paint products industry that we will leave any categorizing up to the manufacturers.