Reflective paint contains glass beads that reflect light, making it useful for highway markings, license plates, and machinery indicators. The size of the beads affects cost and is applied to a colored base for maximum reflectivity. Botts dots and light fixtures use this paint, while other variants reflect thermal and optical energy for building insulation.
Reflective paint is a type of paint that contains thousands of tiny glass spheres, designed to reflect a lot of light, even at night. It is most frequently used for highway markings, but is also used on license plates, fishing lures, on movable tracking objects (such as a golf ball), or as an indicator on some machinery. The size of glass beads varies from application to application, but generally, the smaller the bead, the more expensive it is. The beads are sprayed on after applying the paint for as even a distribution as possible. The pearls are applied to a colored base designed for maximum reflectivity.
The typical glass beads used in reflective paint on highways are fairly inexpensive and are usually mixed with yellow latex paint. This paint is designed to be clearly visible when lit by headlights, but is often visible even without headlights due to ambient light. During the day, the paint is bright, but not bright enough to be overly distracting or blinding. Reflective paint is very useful because materials that glow independently, without needing to be constantly “recharged,” are expensive and radioactive.
A common use of this paint on the highway is on “Botts dots,” the small dots used to separate highway lanes from one another. The introduction of these reflective spots has resulted in a clear increase in road safety.
Another variety is used on the reflective surfaces of light fixtures. This paint has no glass beads built into it, but is designed to be as reflective as possible for a normal coat of paint.
Other variants of reflective paint are designed to reflect thermal and optical energy. These insulators are meant to be applied to the outside of buildings in hot locations to save on air conditioning bills. Some types reflect 44% or more of the energy of sunlight.
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