On the application of electrochemical impedance spectroscopy to study the self-healing properties of protective coatings

Active corrosion protection based on self-healing of defects in coatings is a vital issue for development of new advanced corrosion protection systems. However, there is a significant lack of experimental protocols, which can be routinely used to reveal the self-healing ability and to study the active corrosion protection properties of organic and hybrid coatings.The present work demonstrates the possibility to use EIS (electrochemical impedance spectroscopy) for investigation of the self-healing properties of protective coatings applied on a metal surface. The model EIS experiments supported by SVET (scanning vibrating electrode technique) measurements show that an increase of low frequency impedance during immersion in the corrosive medium is related to the suppression of active corrosion processes and healing of the corroded areas. Thus, EIS can effectively be employed as a routine method to study the self-repair properties of different protective systems. The 2024 aluminium alloy coated with hybrid sol–gel film was used as a model system to study the healing of artificial defects by an organic inhibitor (8-hydroxyquinoline).