Hydrophobic coatings

Here is a video showing a simple 2 part spray on hydrophobic coating.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IPM8OR6W6WE

Website is http://www.spillcontainment.com/everdry


I looked on the site and found no mention of it used on a boat. This seems like it could be awesome as a bottom paint, nothing could adhere. It may even offer some drag savings but my main concern is if it can keep the bottom clean.

Does anyone know of any boat testing with hydrophobic coatings?

 

if it has any kind of resilience and lasting properties it indeed could be pretty awesome for number of boating applications.

 

Are you saying that barnacles and other marine organisms won't get through that coating?

 

I didn't mean to say that, I'm asking that. I have no idea what happens. It seems that since water can't wet the surface then barnacles and such shouldn't have any interest in the surface but who can say without a test.

I'm looking for first hand experience input or reports from some testing. I have contacted the vendor with the same questions and also asked about durability.

 

If it holds up to repeated use in a concrete chute it is indeed abrasion resistent. I can think of lots of uses in the marine world. Thanks for posting about it Red Dwarf.

 

I think you'll that find marine organisms aren't so easily dissuaded from
attaching to surfaces. If it was so easy, every major ship owner would be lining
up to use this, or similar, products. They aren't.

 

Maybe they just need more time. The marine industry moves as quick as cold molasses. The real question is does it inhibit bottom growth? If the big boys say it is BS they must have tested it. Have any of the NA's that frequent the forum seen reports in the industry journals?

 

I was watching a show on tv last night about the Timofey Guzhenko, a Russian icebreaking supertanker. They coated it with 80,000 litres of special low resistance paint. It has to go on at 60'C, two chemicals are mixed at the nozzle.
They reckon it saves 1mm of thickness of steel used in building the hull and saves 10% fuel consumption in ice.
http://www.international-marine.com/literature/intershield163inerta160-whitepaper.pdf
http://www.international-marine.com/marinehome.aspx

 

Ordinary wax is hydrophobic and has been used as an anti fouling coating. I think the main problem is the lifetime of wax on a boat bottom. Barnacles are very inventive and tenacious creatures. Most coatings that claim drag reduction are wetting agents, not anti wetting.

 

If this simple coating really prevents marine growths the industry would move
very quickly. The amount of money, time and effort spent would be well worth
it.

 

Nanotechnology has the potential to cause gigantic problems.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nanotoxicology

 

No comments on the downsides of the new wonder stuffs?

 

Are they finer and more toxic than the small particles produced by motor
vehicles that urban-dwellers ingest every day?

 

Well, it's not like it's a contest. From what I read, diesel smoke puts out nano sized soot particles and at the same time that type of soot has just made the news as a major cause of global warming. But...it gets such wonderful mileage.

People seem so enthralled by and eager to utilize nanotechnology, companies push it as there is money to be made....but nobody knows what effects it will have on life systems. Everyone is excited about carbon nano-tubes and what lightweight, state of the art composite boats can be made from it while common sense and what minimal studies that have been done point to it as being as harmful as asbestos.

There is little money (or inclination) to research this stuff, and so there are no regulations to restrict it's use. Capitalism will not tolerate restrictions based on unproven allegations, while at the same time Capitalism will spend all sorts of money to fund 'research' that will support their views. Here's the CEOs of the tobacco industry telling us tobacco is OK.



The thing with nanos is they are so small they go right through skin, they penetrate cell membranes. They have the potential to disrupt a persons DNA, they cause cancer. They kill bacterial organisms at the base of the food chain, or infiltrate and invade the brains and organs of us big kahunas here at the top. But, if it saves a few bucks on a haul out, or increases a mythological theoretical speed of a boat that hardly ever gets used anyways, why not slather it all over and leach it out into the earth's bloodstream. The bottom has to be clean, that's all that matters.

 

Yah, Im suspicious...Nano needs to be investigated and its effects fully understood.

And, As you say there are already effective, long term, environmentally friendly bottom coatings such as copper, epoxy .