Improvement of Microstructure and Barrier Properties of Silicate Coatings on Low Carbon Steel by Incorporating Colloidal Nano-SiO2

INCORPORATING COLLOIDAL NANO-SiO 2Silicate coatings have been considered as an alternative to toxic and carcinogenic other chemical treatments.In this paper, a strengthened silicate coating was formed on the surface of low carbon steel by dip immersion method.The modification and strengthening was done by loading colloidal nano-SiO 2 into the film.The characterizations of nano-SiO 2 were investigated by FESEM, TEM and FT-IR.The effects of nano contents (weight ratio) and drying temperatures on corrosion properties of silicate film were studied.Potentiodynamic polarization, electrochemical impedance spectroscopy and immersion tests have been used to study corrosion behavior of nano-loaded silicate films.Surface morphology, microstructure and its chemical composition were analyzed by means of FESEM, EDS, AFM, XRD, GIXRD, ATR-FTIR and Raman techniques.Results indicated that colloidal nano-SiO 2 properly modified the silicate coatings and significantly improved the corrosion resistance and barrier property.Also drying temperature showed a considerable effect in silicate coating and higher corrosion resistance was obtained with 150°C curing.