Here at Panache Auto Werke, we want to help you take the best possible care of your car, both its interior and exterior. One of the many services we offer is applying a hydrophobic coating to help protect your vehicle’s body and paint from the elements. In this article, we’ll provide a brief explanation for how hydrophobic coatings work to help you decide if they are right for you.
What is a Hydrophobic Coating?
The word “hydrophobic” comes from the Greek words hydros, meaning water, and phobos, meaning fear. Put them together and you get a term that literally translates into a fear of water, although when it comes to hydrophobic materials, it might be more accurate to say that the water fears the material rather than the other way around. Hydrophobic coatings weaken the water’s ability to bond with the coated surface, which causes the water to stay in self-contained beads rather than spreading out and wetting the object.
How Do Hydrophobic Coatings Work?
As we alluded to above, hydrophobic coatings work by weakening the water’s ability to bond with the surface it’s on, effectively repelling the water droplets. This effect is easiest to grasp when you think about things like waterproof jackets or other clothes–instead of wicking into the cloth fibers the way it otherwise would, the water stays beaded up on the surface of the cloth due to the hydrophobic coating. The same principle applies to hydrophobic coatings for your vehicle–water will be repelled from the surface so that it doesn’t wear out your clear coat or paint job.