Superhydrophobic coating with super-high adhesive strength to substrate

Abstract

Porous and hydrophilic concrete coating on the insulation layers of dam suffered from adhesion of cold water and subsequent icing in a freezing environment, which might result in severe ice pullout phenomenon. Although a lot of superhydrophobic concrete (SC) coatings have been developed, the coatings generally had poor adhesive strength with the insulation layers, which restricted their application in protecting the insulation layers. Herein, we first developed a novel superhydrophobic polymer concrete (SPC) coating by polyacrylate emulsion (PAE) and stone protector addition, and nylon mesh cover. The SPC coating exhibited good superhydrophobicity with a contact angle of ∼156° and a sliding angle of ∼10°. And the adhesive strength between SPC coating and insulation layer was 96 % larger than that of SC coating, indicating much better performance in the insulation layer protection. In addition, the SPC coating possessed excellent surface robustness, anti-icing capacity, and self-cleaning property, and was expected to be a promising candidate for protecting the insulation layers.