Evaluation of anti UV and anti graffiti coatings for contemporary paints in Urban Art

This thesis is part of the agreement between the Ca’ Foscari University of Venice and Cesmar7 and within the framework of the CAPuS project (co-funded by ERASMUS+- Knowledge Alliances, www.capusproject.eu). The aims of the research are to study the chemical and physical stability of selected commercial spray paint formulations, which were chosen as representative of real case studies selected within the CAPuS project in Reggio Emilia, Italy and to evaluate the performance of 5 different anti-graffiti coatings and 2 different UV stabilisers products, in terms of chemical and physical stability and effectiveness in the protection of the underlying paint layers. In order to achieve these objectives, it was decided to perform the characterization of the materials in analysis, with a multi-analytical approach, before and after artificial aging: Infrared spectrophotometry with attenuated total reflectance (FT-ATR), Raman spectroscopy (Raman), Pyrolysis-gas chromatography (Py-GC). Accelerated ageing was carried out with a Q-Sun Xe-3 test chamber (Q-Lab) for 1240 hours. Particular attention was paid to the morphology analysis of the surface of the mock-ups and to their change, before and after the application of the coatings: surfaces observations by Optical microscopy (Dino-Lite Digital Microscope, equipped with visible and UV light-sources and a camera), Contact angle measurements, Colorimetric measurements (Konica Minolta CM 2600d spectrophotometer) and Cross-sections observation under stereomicroscope magnification.