Study on Causes of Premature Disbonding in Epoxy/Urethane Coating System for Ships and Offshore Structures

      Epoxy/urethane finish coating system is widely used for weather parts of ships and offshore structures due to its excellent resistance to UV radiation as well as corrosion protection. Recently, epoxy/epoxy coating system or epoxy/urethane coating system have experienced lots of premature coating failure such as intercoat adhesion failure during winter and spring seasons in particular. For that reason, overall delay of coating procedure and subsequent delay building schedule was inevitable.
      In this study, a typical epoxy/urethane coating system were evaluated in terms of adhesion failure under bad weather conditions such as low ambient temperature, high humidity upon application of  urethane coat to epoxy coated surface. The main causes of premature coating failure were investigated and the essential requirements of coating system were suggested to ensure good coating properties upon application during winter and spring seasons.