Slippery surface with honeycomb structures for enhancing chemical durability of aluminum

Aluminum (Al) and its alloys have been widely used in aviation, shipbuilding, automobile industry and other fields due to their excellent properties. However, the inherent hydrophilicity of Al and its alloys makes them vulnerable to contamination, corrosion, and even damage in harsh environments, which seriously restrains their further applications. To address the above problems, this paper reports a simple, efficient, and non-fluorinated method to prepare a slippery lubricant-infused porous surface (SLIPS). Firstly, the Al substrate was cyclically chemical etched to construct honeycomb-like porous structures. After 1-Octadecanethiol modification and silicone oil injection, the SLIPS was obtained with a water sliding angle (SA) of 3°, and various liquids like water, mud water, ink, juice, milk, 3.5 wt% NaCl , HCl, and NaOH could slide off the SLIPS at an tilted angle of 20°. Then, the prepared SLIPS was subjected to extreme tests such as silicone oil shear stability, repeated tape sticking, and natural environment corrosion, and the SLIPS after these tests still exhibited a SA of 20°. In addition, compared with original Al surface, the SLIPS had longer icing-delaying time and lower ice adhesion strength , showing better anti-icing performance. Finally, polarization curves, Nyquist curves, and equivalent circuit of different surfaces were collected and analyzed, and the results indicated that the SLIPS possessed much better corrosion resistance than the original Al surface. The SLIPS with these superb properties is expected to bring new avenues for marine industrial applications.