D. Roy et al., Blends of maleic-anhydride-grafted polyethylene with polyethylene for improved cathodic disbondment performance, POLYM INT, 50(10), 2001, pp. 1115-1123
Buried metal structures such as pipes are usually protected by a coating, o
ften in conjunction with cathodic protection (CP). Whilst this minimizes co
rrosion, it can also lead to the loss of adhesion between the protective co
ating and metal structure by a phenomenon called cathodic disbondment (CD).
In this study, various medium-density polyethylene (MDPE) compositions wit
h maleic-anhydride-grafted-polyethylene (MAH-g-PE) have been formulated to
investigate the effect on CD performance, as well as both wet and dry bond
strength. The results indicate an improvement in both CD performance and bo
nd strength for all compositions. Differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) a
nd pressure-volume-temperature (PVT) experiments are used to characterize t
he polymer formulations developed and to aid in the understanding of the re
asons for such improvement. Energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDXS) has
been used to obtain surface analysis data on disbonded materials in order
to evaluate the failure mode during the CD process. It is found that there
may be an optimum loading of the polar functional groups in MDPE necessary
for the best CD performance, and that wet adhesion strength (rather than dr
y) is an important parameter to assess and understand the CD performance of
coatings. (C) 2001 Society of Chemical Industry.