Infinity Paint

[dkw1776]

The defunct Home Base carried Infinity Paint which was manufactured exclusively for Home Base.  Infinity made two superior waterborne 100% acrylic paint products  --

Premium High Gloss Enamel, 100% Acrylic Multi-Surface
and
Premium High Gloss Enamel, 100% Acrylic Direct To Metal

Both of these products were rapid dry to touch and after a couple weeks cured to and extrememly durable finish with a very hard and glossy surface.  They both had the characteristics of a high quality industrial enamel.

My questions are these --

Who was Infinity?
Do they still make these products?
Are there equivalent products, readily available, from another manufacturer?

Lastly, many so called waterbased 100% acrylic paints have the word "latex" appearing somewhere on the label, but latex does not appear in the ingredient list.  Latex is a refined plant product, acrylic is a man made polymer resin.  What is latex doing in a 100% acrylic paint, especially when latex does not even appear in the ingredient list?

[John Stauffer, PQI TD]

Infinity was probably a private label brand, likely produced by a large paint company.  We could probably track down the history if necessary.

Regarding the terminology question, water-based paints today utilize a dispersion of plastic-like material in water to serve as the "binder" that holds the pigment together, provides film integrity and toughness, adhesion and impacts nearly all the properties of the paint.  In the as-supplied state, before it is added to the batch of paint, this stuff is milky white, and will dry to for a clear film.  Because of this milky-white appearance, it is commonly know as "latex" (because it looks a lot like natural latex from the rubber tree), and the paints made with it are called "latex paints".  Otherwise, natural latex is not associated with latex paints. There are several types of plastic-like material used in making the latex: 100% acrylic, vinyl-acrylic (also called "PVA" for polyvinyl acetate) and styrene-acrylic are the most commonly used types in North America.  Thus, a label might list acrylic latex or acrylic polymer or vinyl-acrylic copolymer, etc.

The Paint Quality Institute architect's training module provides more detail, and a printable version can be opened via:

http://www.paintquality.com/spec/spec_content/pdf/module1.pdf

I hope this is of help.

Sincerely,

John Stauffer
Technical Director
The Rohm and Haas Paint Quality Institute
North America

[rmichael]

John,

Great post!! Thanks for your input.

rmichael

[dkw1776]

Thank you John,

By the way, can you recommend a water based 100% Acrylic DTM or multi purpose enamel?

Dave