Fabrication of a highly protective silane composite coating with limited water uptake utilizing functionalized carbon nano-tubes

摘要

Water uptake is an influential parameter on the protective properties of coatings. Carbon nano-tubes (CNTs) with different oxidation levels were used in this work to decrease water uptake of silane composite coating. The water uptake of the single-layer coatings was monitored using electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS). In this assessment, power-law formula and effective medium theory (EMT) were exploited considering the parallel combination of the coating and electrolyte. EIS results showed that an increase in oxidation level of CNTs improved the protective functioning of the silane sol-gel coatings due to decrease in water uptake of the coatings.