Preparation of a transparent coating with superamphiphobic and antifouling properties

The wide application of superamphiphobic coatings has attracted the attention of many researchers. At present, the preparation process of coatings still faces challenges such as complex process, high cost, and opacity. Here, we prepared quadrilateral hollow silica nanoparticles by a sol-gel method and then mixed them with chain silica to construct a rough structure with concave micropores. After being modified by 1H, 1H, 2H, 2H, perfluorodecyltriethoxysilane, a superamphiphobic transparent coating with excellent comprehensive performance was obtained. The prepared coatings exhibited high hydrophobicity and oleophobicity. The contact angles of water and ethylene glycol were 170° ± 1 and 150° ± 1, respectively, and the rolling angles were both less than 3° ± 1. The highest transmittance of the coating at 400–800 nm can reach 93.67%. The coating exhibited satisfactory self-cleaning and antifouling properties and maintained excellent superamphiphobicity after mechanical wear and acid-base corrosion. Compared with previous work to achieve transparent superamphiphobic coatings through complex processes, this work provides a way to achieve the simple preparation of transparent superamphiphobic coatings.