Development of superhydrophobic and self-cleaning surfaces using silane-based material and cu-doped tio2 nanoparticles for ceramic wall tiles
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Date
2018-06
Authors
Nurfarah Rasyidah Mohd Safuan
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Abstract
Superhydrophobic property make surfaces easy to clean that act as a water
repellent when water droplet is in contact to the surface. The water droplet will formed
bead-like shape when hitting the surface then roll-off and collect the dust while on the
way. The main focus of this work is to develop a new superhydrophobic surfaces on
ceramic wall tiles for easy cleaning. The newly developed coating need to satisfy
hydrophobic surface requirements which are rough surface and low surface energy.
Copper doped Titania (Cu-doped TiO2) nanotubes was synthesized using hydrothermal
method to be used as incorporation with coating materials. The addition of Cu-doped
TiO2 nanotubes is to create surface roughness and serve as self-cleaning and
antibacterial agent on the substrate. Two different solvents (colloidal silica and silane based materials) were used as a binder that will hold the Cu-doped TiO2 nanotubes on
the ceramic wall tiles (glazed and unglazed) substrate. The Cu-doped TiO2 nanotubes
were deposited on the tiles by dip coating method and by increased the number of
dipping cycle, surface roughness will be formed. Colloidal silica coating that was made
from Ludox AS-40 and Cu-doped TiO2 nanotubes was revealed to be a hydrophilic
surface due to low surface roughness and high surface energy (57.88 ± 0.03 J/m2
) with
low water contact angle (WCA) of 42.73° ± 0.06. While, silane-base coating that was
made from methyltrichlorosilane (MTCS), toluene and Cu-doped TiO2 revealed to be a
superhydrophobic surface because of high surface roughness and low surface energy
(0.00 J/m2) with high WCA up to 153.96°. Therefore, silane-based coating is chosen as
the best solvent to deposit TiO2 on the wall tiles in order to create the superhydrophobic
effect, which can lead to self-cleaning applications