THE EFFECT OF DIFFERENT SILICA (SiO2) NANOPARTICLES WEIGHT PERCENTAGE ON THE MORPHOLOGY OF WATER-BASED COATING

Abstract

A nano-composite coating was prepared by adding SiO₂ nanaoparticles to a commercial water-based acrylic resin at different weight percents (wt.%). The mixing was done using industrial scale overhead stirrer for about 15 minutes at a moderate speed. The mixture was sprayed to the metallic surface to form a thin layer of matt coating. The surface morphology of the coating was investigated using FESEM and the distribution of SiO₂ was studied using elemental mapping with EDX. As the content of SiO₂ increased from 1 to 3 wt.%, the morphology changed significantly. There were three types of morphology observed on the coating attributed from the nano-composite mixing behaviour. However, from the elemental mapping, SiO₂ particles were homogeneously distributed on the coating. Therefore, the nano-composite coating can be developed using this technique, however the mixing parameters need to optimized to produce a good morphology distribution of surface coating.