• Preparation is important.  Remove any heavy/loose rust, loose paint, paint chips, etc. so that at a minimum, surfaces are brought to a combination of tight surface rust, some bare metal, and  firmly bonded.  As almost all shipping containers have been exposed to salt, power wash with a salt remover.  Power washing alone will not remove all salts from the metal.  Even traces of salt will accelerate corrosion and draw moisture under all paints.
• Areas where there is rust, bare metal, or cracked paint can be spot primed, encapsulated, and locked down with a marine-grade (DTM) paint like Rust Grip.
• As Rust Grip has aluminum in it, is light grey with a matte finish. If you are looking for pure corrosion protection and the look new metal, Rust Grip is all you need.  It is designed to perform on its own as a 1 coating system and is fully UV stable.
• If you have a particular color in mind, you can top coat Rust Grip or clean firmly bonded existing paint with a high quality top coat like Enamo Grip. Enamo Grip which is a very hard enamel urethane, can be custom tinted to any exact color specification or finish.

For the best durability on shipping containers, a marine-grade urethane top coat like Enamo Grip, will last the longest.  While many people recommend acrylic paint for shipping containers due to their lower cost, urethanes are more durable, harder, scuff resistant, and more UV stable (less color fading) than acrylics.  Urethanes are also more resistant to heavy moisture and high humidity.  This is especially  important in harsher environments such as coastal areas.

For older containers where the paint is aged/faded but fully intact with no rust bleeding, or peeling, Enamo Grip can be applied right over it. If the container is relatively new with some sheen, you’ll need to rough up/lightly sand the surfaces for profile and power wash.  Enamo Grip can be easily brushed, rolled, or sprayed on.

As many commercial and industrial users are very particular about the colors they use, Enamo Grip, our marine/industrial grade enamel urethane top coat, is often custom tinted and finished to an exact specification or spectrometer matched to a competitors color/finish. We have some standard colors and some safety colors in stock as well.

Rust Grip and Enamo Grip are fully UV stable and highly resistant to fading, chalking, or peeling. They are specifically designed for marine and industrial applications under the harshest conditions. These coatings were originally made for energy companies to use on rusted oil rigs that are constantly exposed to direct and reflected sun and high levels of salt.  When used in less aggressive environments, they will simply outlast just about any commercial paint.