Corrosion protection of aluminium alloys by sol-gel coatings

Present paper studies the corrosion protection of three new nanomeric coatings obtained from modified silanes and cured at low temperatures. The synthesis of these coatings is carried out starting from a mixture of two sols separately prepared: a prehydrolized GPTS (glicidoxipropiltrimetoxisilano) and a second sot TEOS/MTES. Adding to this initial sot a colloidal solution of 25% in weight of commercial particles of SiO2, Aerosil 300 and Aerosil R972 respectively can be obtained thicker nanomeric coatings. Once synthesized, they were deposited by means of the spin coating method onto two aluminum alloys, 5555 and 3005 used as substrates. The final thickness of the coatings is about 10 pm, for the coating without particles and slightly higher, 12-14 mum approximately, for the coatings with particles. The electrochemical results indicated that, in all cases, the coated samples presented an improvement in the corrosion behavior in comparison with bare alloys in aggressive media of NaCl. The corrosion rate decreased three orders of magnitude for the coatings with particles and lower for those that do not contain particles.