Investigation of the wettability, anticorrosion, and accelerated weathering behaviors of siloxane-modified acrylic resin and functionalized graphene nanocomposite coatings on LY12 aluminum alloy

Abstract

To expand the applications of graphene which has so far been limited by the expensive nature of single-layer graphene, the effects of varying percentages of low-cost functionalized multilayer graphene nanosheets in siloxane-modified organic coatings were studied. The hydrophobic organic siloxane–acrylic resin was prepared by solution polymerization of acrylic monomers, and the graphene nanosheets were functionalized using fluorosilane. The coatings were sprayed on the LY12 aluminum substrate, and the wettability, anticorrosion, conductive, and accelerated weathering behaviors were comprehensively examined. It is shown that the increasing addition of functionalized graphene nanosheets increases the water contact angle and the surface conductivity. At 5% graphene loading, coating–substrate adhesion remains almost unchanged, while the electrochemical impedance parameters revealed good anticorrosion performance up to 10% loading. The surface measurements and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) results confirmed the photostabilization ability of graphene loading in acrylic coatings during the accelerated weathering test. Also, the mechanical properties of the coatings were not damaged during the exposure, and pitting corrosion sites were observed only on the 20% graphene-filled coatings after 1000 h of exposure. These integrated analyses of mechanical properties and environmental accelerated tests are beneficial to engineering applications of graphene coatings.