Self-healing anticorrosive organic coating based on an encapsulated water reactive silyl ester: Synthesis and proof of concept

In this paper a self-healing anticorrosive organic coating based on an encapsulated water reactive organic agent is presented. A reactive silyl ester is proposed as a new organic reactive healing agent and its synthesis, performance, incorporation into an organic coating and evaluation of self-healing capabilities is described. Such silyl esters are good candidates to be used in self-healing anticorrosive organic coating systems since they present the capability to react with water/humidity and metallic substrates, removing thus the need of presence of a crosslinker or catalyst in the system unlike traditional encapsulated approaches. In order to prove the self-healing ability and reactivity of the presented silyl ester encapsulated system, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) and scanning vibrating electrode technique (SVET) were used, showing the high capability of these techniques to be used in the development and evaluation of self-healing anticorrosive organic coatings and the good results in corrosion protection offered by the proposed silyl ester healing agent.