In this study, a photocatalytic solution was coated on mortar to remove pollutants by self-cleaning the structure. Experimental variables included the photocatalyst concentration of the coating solution, the presence or absence of super-hydrophilic an...
In this study, a photocatalytic solution was coated on mortar to remove pollutants by self-cleaning the structure. Experimental variables included the photocatalyst concentration of the coating solution, the presence or absence of super-hydrophilic and the primer solution, and two types of mortar. The photocatalytic concentrations of the coating solution were 1.5% and 3.0%, and super-hydrophilic solutions with a photocatalytic concentration of 1.5% were used. In addition, the primer was applied before coating the photocatalyst solution. Besides, mortar coated by the photocatalytic solution was prepared in two types: mortar using Ordinary Portland Cement (OPC) and ultra-high performance concrete (UHPC). According to the mortar properties, UHPC showed a higher flow than that of the mortar specimen using OPC due to the influence of high-performance admixtures. In addition, the compressive strength of UHPC was higher than that of the mortar specimen using OPC. The methylene blue testing method was used to evaluate the self-cleaning performance of the photocatalytic coating. As a result of visual observation, the color of the methylene blue aqueous solution of the photocatalytic coated mortar was changed. Therefore, it is concluded that self-clean by photocatalytic coating was effective. The color change rate of the methylene blue aqueous solution increased as the photocatalytic concentration increased. The super-hydrophilic photocatalytic solution was expected to be advantageous in self-cleaning performance, but the self-cleaning performance of the specimen with super-hydrophilic photocatalytic solution was lower than that of the specimens with general photocatalytic solution. The self-cleaning performance of the photocatalytic solution using the primer did not show a significant difference from that of the photocatalytic solution without the primer. The primer was applied between the mortar and the photocatalytic coating improving adhesion performance between the mortar and the photocatalytic coating. It was determined that the self-cleaning performance of the UHPC specimen was higher than that of the OPC-based mortar specimen because the binder particles used were smaller than that of the OPC-based mortar specimen and the pores were small.