New Generation Coatings - A Combination of Thermal Spray and Organic Paint Coatings to give Enhanced Corrosion Protection in Aggressive Environments

Abstract

There is a great concern about the frequent replenis- hment of paint coatings on certain specfic structures and installations, especially erected in aggressive marine environments. Various analysis have shown that a best paint coating with best surface finish and pre-treatment cannot guaranty a life more than 5 years. Hence alternative methods of protecting such structures in aggressive environment is really the need of the hour. Metal coatings using thermal spray is becoming very popular. There are of course some limitations of thermal spray coatings which can either be overcome by modification of the process or by combining thermal spray with organic paint coatings. Such new generation coatings are now guarantying a life of more than 20 years to 40 years. Principal of thermal spray coatings and their application to structures in highly aggressive environments is discussed in this paper.