Today’s Department of Defense is charged with the pursuit of environmentally preferable
alternatives to products and processes traditionally used. The highly specialized coating
process of the military aircraft is one area where such an initiative is underway. NASA, in
coordination with the Tri-Services is actively seeking greener alternatives to chromate coatings.
This paper will discuss the development of a non-toxic, non-hazardous, self-healing
pretreatment as well as a low VOC, water based wash primer. After vigorous in house testing,
it has been determined that these products will be included in the NASA study. The products
will undergo both real world evaluations in a salt water environment, as well as in-depth
laboratory testing.
Key Words: Corrosion, aircraft, coating, pretreatment, wash primer