Inorganic/organic hybrid coatings for aircraft aluminum alloy substrates

A series of water-based stable sol–gel systems have been developed. Various functional groups including amino, epoxy, vinyl, and allyl groups can be incorporated into the sol–gel network to interact with organic polymer resins. The solid content of these sol–gel-based coating formulations varies from 2.5 to 45%. The sol–gel coating of alumina–silica networks derived from low solid content solutions (2.5%) has been developed and evaluated to replace the current conversion coating pretreatment process. Sol–gel coatings derived from the high solid content solutions (17–45%) have shown excellent mechanic strength, good adhesion, and provide corrosion protection of the aluminum substrate when cured at elevated temperatures. Sol–gel/epoxy resin hybrid coatings have been formulated and studied. The hybrid coating showed enhanced mechanical strength such as hardness and abrasion resistance. When cured at elevated temperatures (80°C), all of the hybrid coatings studied passed wet adhesion testing. Some of the hybrid coatings pass wet adhesion testing when cured at room temperature. However, water-sensitivity remains for most of the room temperature cured hybrid coatings.