Recent emerging strategies to prepare icephobic coatings have focused on slippery surfaces containing a liquid lubricant with low surface energy, which significantly reduces ice adhesion. In this work, a facile technique was developed for preparation of polysiloxane coatings with efficient and durable icephobicity. Fluorinated polyhedral oligomeric silsesquioxanes (F-POSS-SiH) with different fluorinated groups and Si-H active sites were synthesized via hydrosilylation between fluorinated methacrylates and octakis(dimethylsiloxy) octasilsequioxane. The F-POSS-SiH hybrid compound was subsequently applied as a co-crosslinker in the system of polymethylhydrosiloxane (PMHS) and polymethylvinylsiloxane to create silicone coatings. The low surface energy of fluorinated groups could drive F-POSS-SiH towards the coating surface, leading to a gradient distribution in which F-POSS-SiH was self-assembled on the top surface, while silicone was rich in the bottom layer. Meanwhile, wavy surfaces were generated spontaneously by compressive stress during the coating formation. The wavy microstructure of coatings provided space for the unreacted silicone oil, i.e., low molecular weight PMHS, that could be considered as a liquid lubricant and controlled by the dosage. Therefore, the slippery wavy coatings showed highly icephobic properties with extraordinarily low ice shear strengths at a lowest value of 3.8 ± 1.8 kPa, only 5 percentage of Sylgard 184. Moreover, the coatings remained icephobicity after 15 icing/deicing cycles, demonstrating excellent durability.
Chao Tao,Xiaohui Li,Bo Liu,Kaiqiang Zhang,Yunhui Zhao,Kongying Zhu,Xiaoyan Yuan.
Progress in Organic Coatings,103,48-59(2017)