One-step spraying route to construct a bio-inspired, robust, multi-functional and superhydrophobic coatings with corrosion resistance, self-cleaning and anti-icing properties

Abstract

Aimed at getting rid of the complicated preparation procedure, multi-functional superhydrophobic coatings inspired by natural plants have been successfully constructed on different matrix via a facile and effective spraying technology in this paper. The innovation of this paper lies in directly employing the unmodified fillers to establish the superhydrophobic coatings system with high performance. The results have revealed that the water contact angle (WCA) and water sliding angle (WSA) of as-prepared coatings can reach 155.4° and 8°, confirming the superhydrophobicity with low surface adhesion is achieved. And the potential superhydrophobic mechanism can be ascribed to the enrichment of low surface energy components on the homogeneous and rough grain structure of as-prepared coatings. Simultaneously, as-prepared coatings have exhibited the good self-cleaning property, anti-fouling property, and anti-icing property. Surprisingly, the mechanical stability of superhydrophobic coatings can be maintained after 50 cycles during the friction experiments. And the oil-water separation ability for the coated metal meshes was also obtained with high separation efficiency of 95%. Moreover, the anti-corrosion ability was also systematically investigated and its potential anti-corrosion mechanism of superhydrophobic coatings is primarily deduced. Therefore, the multifunctional and robust superhydrophobic coatings with biomimetic structure were established via a simple strategy, which is expected to be applied in field of metal corrosion and protection and multi-functional surface material in the future.