Nano-scale inks could lighten airliners by hundreds of kilograms

https://newatlas.com/ ^ | January 30, 2024 | Loz Blain

[Jonty30]

Kobe University researchers have created a new "structural color ink," just 100-200 nanometers thick, that shows bright colors from wide viewing angles, without fading, while weighing less than half a gram per square meter (0.002 oz per square foot).

Regular paints and pigments absorb certain wavelengths of light and reflect others, but this tends to degrade them at the molecular level, leading to fading.

Structural colors, on the other hand, reflect the full spectrum of light from parallel nanostructures, set just the right distance apart to cancel out certain wavelengths. It's the effect that gives butterfly wings and peacock feathers their gorgeous, shimmering hues. Because light isn't being absorbed, just reflected off structures, the colors don't fade – but the effect is often highly dependent on viewing angle, leading to dazzling iridescence that's beautiful in nature, but a little out-there for most industrial colorings.

[Jonty30]

That's interesting to me. One doesn't think about how much paint weighs on a plane and lightening it by 90% means a plane that weighs about 1,000 less and the logos would still be just as visible.

[sevlex]

Or you could just punch holes in the fuselage.

[rfp1234]

OK. That’s the equivalent mass of one Michael Moore, or 0.5 Rosie O’Donnells. But they fly private anyway.

[RetiredTexasVet]

Nowhere in the article did I see anything about the actual tests, short or long term. Just modelled it like climate change?

[monkeyshine]

Just go with aluminum. No extra weight.

[NWFree]

They look like puke pastels in the write up

[Jonty30]

What you are reading is probably the measurements in a lab, but not yet perfected to the point of commercialization.

[Jonty30]

It says that it’s not iridescent, but pastels.

[Round Earther]

Tip of the day:

Take a belt sander to your car with 60 grit sand paper, strip all the paint and decrease vehicle weight to get better gas milage.

[762X51]

I think Braniff used all those colors together back in the 70s.

[Zuriel]

**Just go with aluminum. No extra weight.**

The glowbulleestas are going to stop air travel for the masses. Any trips will be virtual reality, kinda like Saul’s last sights (in ‘Soylent Green’).

[Jonty30]

Or, when they commercialize this technology and used it to paint your car, you might save 4kgs of weight.

According to a fuel efficiency chart, 50kg of weight increase will reduce efficiency by 1%, probably more but we will work with that.

4kgs reduction in weight is about 0.08% savings. On my car, I have to fill up every two weeks. So, on my schedule, saving 0.08% on a fill because I changed paints would work out to be 0.052 litres of gas. That’s about 1.35 litres of savings a year and about 20litres over my car’s lifetime.

Not enough to do anything about it, but I would not say no to going with that paint as an option if I was buying that care brand new

[ProtectOurFreedom]

From Jalopnik...

Originally the Shuttle’s external tank was painted with white latex paint not just to match its fellow Orbiter and Solid Rocket Boosters components, but to reflect UV rays, keeping the tanks’ liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen fuel cool after being filled prior to launch.

After the first two Shuttle flights, STS-1 and STS-2, NASA and Lockheed Martin, who built the tanks, decided that this extra bit of thermal protection was not really needed and that 600 pounds could be saved by not including it. The weight saved by omitting the white paint could be used for extra payload or performance. As a result, future missions reverted to the tank’s insulating foam’s natural tone, which was rust orange in color.

STS-1 below:

Six hundred pounds is a lot of additional payload for just not painting the tanks!

[martin_fierro]

[alexander_busek]

That's interesting to me. One doesn't think about how much paint weighs on a plane and lightening it by 90% means a plane that weighs about 1,000 less and the logos would still be just as visible.

Many, many moons ago, I read a technical article about using a different, slightly lighter material on which to print Airline Safety Instructions (always found in that little storage pouch on the back of the seat in front of each passenger).

By using a different material, the weight of each set of instructions could be reduced by a couple of grams. The article went on to calculate how much fuel that would save per million miles.

This was even before "carbon dioxide emissions" were decried as "climate-killers."

Regards,

[Portcall24]

I wonder if one could paint a car with it? A lighter car should translate into better mileage.

[anton]

Or, they could make the fat lady buy two seats.