Editorial Magazine 2021/2
FILIFORM CORROSION AND DISINFORMATION
“Unfortunately, we tend to believe that almost everything we see or read is true, even if we fool ourselves, we have a critical detachment. But, once we find ourselves in the communication circuit, we can no longer get out of it, nor be again what we used to be.”
This is what Dario Fertilio* wrote in his recent essay on disinformation. His words reminded me of what currently happens in the scientific world, and particularly in that corner of the world which is aluminium painting. There is a lot of talk of an incurable disease which affects painted aluminium called “filiform corrosion”.
But, even if research, reports and meetings carried out in recent years have centered on the above topic with the aim to cast some fight on such a confused subject, disinformation lays in the fact that the results achieved have been much more confusing and pessimistic than before: aluminium in the door and window industry has thus suffered all to the advantage of wood and PVC. This is what I call "disinformation", and I think this is not just a personal opinion.
The editorial office has received hundreds of phone calls by painters who are uncertain about their future; they do not know who to believe among those who say they have the right "recipe" or "medicine" against filiform corrosion and those that pretend that such recipe does not and will never exist for much time to come. Nevertheless, there are scientific hypotheses, but they are not linked with the others and yet bewildering; it would only take to put them together to have the first solution to the "puzzle". Some research holds the composition of the aluminium alloy responsible for filiform corrosion, when pretreatment, painting and other finishing work have
been carried out properly.
Others talk about wrong or unsuitable pretreatment, others about poor painting. There are those who blame incautious subsequent processing of profiles and sheets (bending, cutting, assembly of materials coating the metal) which leaves metal parts uncoated or partially uncoated.
Others say that filiform corrosion depends mainly on the type of environment and pollution (marine, industrial, etc.). For the sake of information, there are still those who say filiform corrosion does not exist in some countries of the world (lucky them!).
Information would prevail if the various international painting associations and organizations would sit around a table to compare the various reports of the different serious research institutes, and on the basis of the data gathered, could reach reliable conclusions.
With the aim to reach some substantial result our magazine compels itself to report on each issue concerning the various hypotheses on the explanation and solution to the problem. At the end there will be a comprehensive view which could help to reach more logic and persuading conclusions.
We wish to all researchers, who co-operate with our project, success along with the optimism which is needed when you believe in scientific and technological progress.
Walter Dalla Barba,
Editor and Chairman of the Aluminium Two Thousand World Congress 2023 and Alusurface 2022
