Super-hydrophobic coating prepared by mechanical milling method
In a recently conducted study, a super-hydrophobic coating with a contact angle of around 153° was fabricated by ball milling a copper powder and stearic acid mixture onto an aluminum foil.
In mechanical milling, stearic acid can be used as a process control agent to reduce the interface energy between powders and contribute to the crushing of powder particulates. In this study, a super-hydrophobic coating with a contact angle of 153° ± 2° was fabricated by ball milling a copper powder and stearic acid mixture onto an aluminum foil.
Rough structure
Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy demonstrated that stearic acid was successfully transferred to the surface of the copper powder, and scanning electron microscopy revealed that the structure of the super-hydrophobic coating consisted of irregular particles and sheets. The combined effect of low surface free energy and rough structure of the copper-based coating contributed to the super-hydrophobicity.
The study has been published in Journal of Coatings Technology and Research Volume 19, 2022.
