Coating Technology
Within the Coatings Technology research area frontier research in the general field of organic coatings is performed. The aim is to develop fundamental insights that will lead to innovative coating technologies. The research is pre-competitive and is focused at achieving sustainability and quality of life improvements and economic growth (DPI business plan 2008-2015), preparing the coatings industry for future challenges.
Subprogrammes
Renewable raw materials, formulation and powder coatings
• Investigating the feasibility of the use of sustainable, renewable resources for the development of alternative monomers and co-monomers for the production of coating resins, without compromising the final coating (film) properties.
• Gaining a fundamental understanding of the colloidal stability of waterborne coatings as a basis for increasing their shelf-life and the number of applications.
• With a view to extending the application field (wood, MDF, plastics) for powder coatings, finding innovative solutions to meet the stringent demands on the cure window with respect to both rheology (levelling) and reactivity (cure).
• A new project started in 2008 and is directed towards the development of daylight / sunlight photoinitiating systems to the polymerisation of organic resins and characterisation of the coatings. Structure-property relationships will be thoroughly investigated with the goal of understanding the relations between the actinic light and its irradiance, the chemical structure of the polymer network and the mechanical properties of the cured materials.
Functional (smart) coatings
The objective is to develop new coatings with additional functional properties at the surface as well as in the bulk apart from protecting underlying layers and decorating effects, which are the functionalities normally associated with coatings. Preferably, these additional functional properties should be demonstrated using fewer sequential coating layers. Therefore structure-property relationships are extensively studied in the research field. Examples of functions which are explored in this area are: self-healing properties of coatings, antimicrobial activity, increased adherence between polymers and metal by surface modification of the metal substrate and the development of super-hydrophobic coatings by incorporation of hydrophobic monomers in the resin system.
Durability and testing of industrial coatings
The aim of this sub-cluster is to create fundamental understanding of the degradation mechanisms of coatings used in outdoor exposure. Furthermore, the programme aims to develop new testing and analysis methods for coatings, such as adhesion, gloss, drying and scratch resistance. Typical examples of research topics are: investigation towards the physicalchemical relationship during coating degradation, systematic study on the molecular aspects of scratch resistance, a fundamental study towards the mobility of water and charge carriers in polymer/oxide/Aluminum alloys in relation to corrosion protection of the metal surface (project in cooperation with M2i) and investigation of the drying mechanism of coatings using 3D imaging techniques.
