Water-borne base coating composition for automobiles

1. A water-borne base coating composition for automobiles comprising

an emulsion resin obtained by emulsion polymerization of an α,β-ethylenically unsaturated monomer mixture having an acid value of 3 to 50 and comprising at least 65% by mass of a (meth)acrylate ester whose ester moiety contains one or two carbon atoms, a coloring component comprising an optically coherent flaky pigment, and an acrylic polymer compound having a weight average molecular weight of 400,000 to 1,500,000 and represented by the general formula (1):

in the formula, A and B are the same or different and each represents a molecular terminal group resulting from radical polymerization, a terminal group resulting from hydrolysis thereof, a hydrogen atom or a hydroxyl group; M represents a carboxylic acid group or a carboxylic acid group neutralized with ammonia or a primary, secondary or tertiary amine compound, N represents a carboxylic acid group, a carboxylic acid ester group whose ester moiety contains one or more carbon atoms, or a carboxylic acid group neutralized with ammonia or a primary, secondary or tertiary amine compound; m is an integer of not less than 1 and n is an integer of not less than 0, provided that m/9 is not less than n; and R is a hydrogen atom or a methyl group,

the content of said acrylic polymer compound on the solid basis being 0.3 to 4.0% by mass relative to the resin solids in the coating composition.

2. The water-borne base coating composition for automobiles according to claim 1 ,

which comprises a polyether polyol having, on an average, not less than 0.02 primary hydroxyl group per molecule, and having a number average molecular weight of 300 to 3,000 and a water tolerance value of not less than 2.0.

3. The water-borne base coating composition for automobiles according to claim 2 ,

wherein the polyether polyol has not less than one primary hydroxyl group per molecule and a hydroxyl value of 30 to 700.