The system was selected following Heinrich Schmid’s experience with the coating in other industrial market segments. According to Steelpaint, the one-coat approach was intended to provide corrosion protection while reducing application complexity compared with conventional multicoat civil engineering coating systems.

Surface preparation included mechanical grinding to PSt2 and abrasive blasting to PSa 2 to prepare the steel substrate for coating application.

The project represented Steelpaint’s first large-scale civil engineering application in Germany for the Stelcatec system. The company is more commonly associated with coatings used in marine, offshore and hydraulic engineering applications.

According to Steelpaint, a factor in the system’s selection was its suitability for application during late autumn and winter. Conventional multicoat systems can require scaffold encapsulation, heating and humidity control to achieve suitable curing conditions in cold and damp weather.

“The project is being carried during a period that is typically unfavorable for external coatings work,” said Steelpaint Director Frank Müller. “Stelcatec is designed to expand the workable application window, allowing steel protection to proceed without the need for full scaffold enclosure or artificial climate control. This simplifies application and helps maintain project schedules.”

Florian Stark, team leader at Heinrich Schmid, said: “From an applicator’s perspective, reducing the number of coats and environmental controls required can have a direct impact on logistics, scheduling and overall costs. On this project, the system has enabled steady progress under challenging seasonal conditions.”

The DERTour Deutschland office building in Frankfurt am Main is the first building in Germany to use a Stelcatec coating system for corrosion protection. Photo courtesy of Steelpaint.

Steelpaint said the project illustrates how coating technologies developed for industrial environments can be used in civil engineering applications where construction schedules, access constraints and weather exposure are important considerations.

“This project shows that a one-coat corrosion protection system can be deployed at meaningful scale on a civil engineering façade in Germany,” Müller said. “It supports our strategy of broadening Stelcatec’s application beyond traditional marine and hydraulic markets into building and infrastructure projects.”

DERTour Deutschland, part of the DERTour Group, operates in tour operation, travel agency and destination management. The Frankfurt building serves as an office location for the company’s German operations and includes a steel-intensive façade construction.

The corrosion-protection work is part of a broader building renewal program. External coating work began in September and was scheduled for completion in March 2026.