Construction of transparent, robust and haze-selectable superhydrophobic coatings with honeycomb structure

Transparent superhydrophobic coatings have excellent self-cleaning performance and are particularly suitable for applications in the fields of outdoor photovoltaic displays, solar power generation, and windows. However, the micro-nanostructures required for superhydrophobic coatings make them poor abrasion-resistant and foggy, and hence transparent superhydrophobic coatings with good practicality still remain great challenging. Here, we report honeycomb-structured coatings simultaneously with high transparency, abrasion-resistance and superhydrophobicity by fabrication of honeycomb epoxy resin structure via PDMS template method and subsequent spraying of hydrophobic SiO2 nanoparticles. The coatings with different honeycomb structures exhibit average transmittance of 90.0 %, and the haze in the range of 8.9–54.1 %. Both the honeycomb structure formed by hard epoxy resin and strong adhesion of hydrophobic SiO2 nanoparticles enable the coatings to maintain superhydrophobicity after harsh mechanical abrasion and weathering.