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Computationally-accelerated prediction of polyester-melamine coatings degradation to design sustainable organically-coated steels for outdoor applications

Chris Batchelor, Francisco Martin-Martinez, Christian Griffiths, Ian Mabbett Orcid Logo, James Smith, Eifion Jewell Orcid Logo

RSC Advances, Volume: 14, Issue: 26, Pages: 18343 - 18354

Swansea University Authors: Chris Batchelor, Francisco Martin-Martinez, Christian Griffiths, Ian Mabbett Orcid Logo, Eifion Jewell Orcid Logo

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DOI (Published version): 10.1039/d3ra06744k

Abstract

This work implements computational chemistry as a screening tool to aid in the coating and resin formulation process. Conceptual Density Functional theory (DFT) reactivity descriptors like the global chemical hardness and the dual descriptor Fukui function identify the tendency of polyester-melamine...

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Published in: RSC Advances
ISSN: 2046-2069
Published: Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) 2024
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URI: https://cronfa.swan.ac.uk/Record/cronfa66585
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Abstract: This work implements computational chemistry as a screening tool to aid in the coating and resin formulation process. Conceptual Density Functional theory (DFT) reactivity descriptors like the global chemical hardness and the dual descriptor Fukui function identify the tendency of polyester-melamine coatings to undergo electrophilic and nucleophilic attack during weathering exposure. Coatings were subjected to natural and accelerated weathering tests, with periodic infrared spectroscopy, colour, and gloss measurements to assess for the degree of changes brought about through photodegradation. It was found that the number of attack sites in the atomistic models, when weighted as a function of the polyester : crosslinker ratio, effectively ranked the degradation of different coating systems upon weathering. This ranking matched the performance of the coatings subjected to both accelerated and natural weathering, showing affinity with naturally weathered samples, and matching in all areas. The results were shown to demonstrate significant correlation, being over R2 = 0.8 for 7 of the 8 measured areas, and greater than R2 = 0.9 for 6 compared areas. Comparison of computationally derived and experimentally acquired results showed that the performance of naturally weathered samples was matched across all areas by the computational rankings, showing superior correlation than that observed between natural and accelerated weathering tests. This indicates that the method utilised within this work provides a novel, cost-effective alternative to evaluate the projected performance of selected coatings, while enabling a computationally accelerated platform for more sustainable low-degradation coatings without the requirement of long-term weathering tests.
College: Faculty of Science and Engineering
Funders: EP/L015099/1
Issue: 26
Start Page: 18343
End Page: 18354