Glamor from the Lab

The perfect nail polish doesn't drip, has a brilliant shine and lasts a long time. But what additives do the best job of achieving that? And how can you test a formulation to make sure it keeps its promises?

A Market with Growth Potential

Nail polish is having a moment. Influencers and celebrities are presenting their latest creations on social media. Nail artists are offering tips on how to apply polish perfectly or achieve a glitter effect. And, of course, everyone’s posting their freshly done nails to inspire imitators.

The Effects Make the Difference

How long does it last? Does the polish apply well? Does it dry quickly? These are the questions consumers ask when they study the nail polish shelves. Our highly effective additives can make polishes easy to apply, enhance their shine or lend them powerful adhesive properties. Laboratory tests also ensure that a polish will deliver on its promises.

WACKER Additives: Turning Ordinary Nails into a Sensation

Beauty and BELSIL^® Belong Together

Whether you like your nail polish fire-engine red, glittery or with a discreet mother-of-pearl finish, good adhesion is still its most important property. Our BELSIL^® P 1101 additive significantly improves adhesion and can easily be added to any standard formulation.

On the one hand, BELSIL^® P 1101 prevents the polish from flaking. It also makes it resistant to scratches and abrasion, allowing it to retain its glamorous luster for a long time – even if you’re building a sand castle with the kids or working around the house or in the garden.

HDK^® for Perfect Texture

Our HDK^® pyrogenic silica lets you perfectly adjust the rheology of a nail polish. This additive delivers thixotropic properties that make polishes highly viscous, so that they go on evenly without dripping.

HDK^® also keeps pigments from settling, distributing them evenly during application. Users can look forward to flawless, smooth results.

BELSIL^® P 1101, our film-forming hybrid silicon, does more than just improve the technical performance of nail polish – it also lends nails a unique texture and a silky soft touch. Every participant in our tests could tell which formulation contained our silicone simply by feeling the painted nail. In other words, BELSIL^® P 1101 lends the polish something of a haptic signature.

Dr. Tassilo Habereder, Personal Care Development, Wacker Chemie AG

Precision Formulations, Extensive Testing

What are the qualities of a good nail polish? Experience and an obsession with details. At WACKER, we’ve spent decades working to improve coatings. We develop formulations for customers in our paints and coatings lab, testing the results according to international standards. How long does it last? Is it aesthetically pleasing? Is it easy to apply? Answering these questions is at the heart of many tests. Learn about the most important of these below:

The Starting Point for All Testing

Nail polish can go on thick or thin, but in order to compare formulations, the film thickness needs to be defined. And to prevent the substrate from affecting the tests, a minimum coating thickness has to be specified as well. Watch this video to see how we make a standardized test piece.

Blade Coating Process, Measuring Coating Thickness

First, we fill a 4-sided applicator frame with nail polish and then pull the frame evenly across an aluminum or glass plate. Preventing bubbles from arising here is key, as this is the only way to produce a smooth surface. Once the nail polish has cured, we measure the film thickness in micrometers.

What Pendulums Tell Us about Hardness

The harder the nail polish, the less susceptible it is to damage. Pendulum damping testers can be used for determining precise, reproducible hardness values.

The Erichsen Pendulum Test

This test is based on a simple principle: a standardized pendulum resting on the coated surface is set in motion (oscillates). The harder the coating, the greater the frequency of oscillation. Technically speaking, the device measures the mechanical damping properties of the coating.

What We Can Learn from Scratches

For a nail polish to last a long time, it must adhere well to the nail. That requires a clean, grease-free surface – it also depends on the adhesive properties of the formulation.

Cross-Cut Tests for Determining Adhesion

This testing device scratches parallel lines into the polish, rotates the test piece 90 degrees and repeats the process. To assess the adhesion of the polish, we match the appearance of the cross-cut pattern to a DIN comparison image. This allows us to determine the degree of damage and/or the adhesion class.

How Quickly Does the Polish Peel Off?

Most nail polish users prefer a glossy surface and an attractive shine that lasts as long as possible. How long depends on the scrub and scratch resistance of the polish.

Abrasion Test for Determining Scrub Resistance and Measuring Gloss

We explicitly developed the abrasion test for determining the scrub resistance of nail polishes. The aim of the test is to simulate the day-to-day stress involved in activities such as washing dishes or making repairs around the house. We do this by going over the nail polish with a scouring pad. After a fixed number of abrasion cycles, we measure the gloss. The reduction in gloss tells us the extent to which the surface has been damaged and/or how abrasion resistant the polish is.

First the Effect, Then the Product

Succeed on Your Market – with Our Expertise

At WACKER we know how to create leading paints and coatings products and improve existing ones. Take advantage of that knowledge: fill out this form to contact our nail polish experts directly.

Tobias Franzke, Personal Care/Nail Polish, WACKER SILICONES, Burghausen

Contact Tobias

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