Weathering around the World: discovering new market opportunities for sustainable organic coatings

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

Background:Tata Steel UK is one of the largest producers of pre-painted steel in Europe and produces top range products which are specified throughout Europe, primarily for use in the construction industry. To maintain this position, the organisation is constantly trying to improve the current product range and look for new market opportunities to support sales growth. These sales growth opportunities in new markets throughout the world are away from our core markets and research is required to investigate the polymer performance and climatic conditions in these new markets and determine recommendations for longevity in these markets. Through this research, recommendations can be given to the business as to the products to be used, colour choice, opportunities and product guarantees for new markets. The research will involve working closely with the Tata business and research into new sustainable product opportunities, new markets and new customers throughout the world.The project aims of the research include: - Working in conjunction with the business, looking at new markets throughout the world and research typical climatic conditions. From this, determining the pre-finished steel performance for various construction applications- Working with current products and future new products and providing recommendations to the business as to product suitability per market- Analysing materials that have been degraded through external or accelerated testing.- Using analytical techniques such as UV, ATR FTIR and Raman spectroscopy to determine the mechanism and rates of organic coating degradation and erosion. - Understanding how different climatic conditions affect the coating characteristics using through depth profile and surface analysis.- Further developing non-destructive techniques to assess performance of weathered samples such as colour, gloss, blister formation and creep measurement.- Providing recommendations to the performance in use of various pre-painted steel products in the new markets.