Watch This Crazy Coating Completely Repel Water

When the PR department of a paint company promises something that’s “unlike any product we’ve manufactured before,” it’s easy to be skeptical. However, I’ll admit Rust-Oleum came through with the goods during a recent demonstration of its NeverWet Multi-Surface Liquid Repelling Treatment.

Like all well-marketed home products, NeverWet’s name leaves little to the imagination. Any water-based liquids that come into contact with concrete, wood, plastics, metal, or fabric treated with NeverWet will bead up and roll off, literally. In our demo, the product specialist poured water into a 3D maze that was coated in the stuff. The water quickly gathered into a single blob and rolled around the maze like liquid metal. (It reminded me of those old mercury-based games we had during the 1980s. Good riddance to them.) Another demo saw water flash off a piece of plywood as though it never even touched it.

The technology at work here is known as superhydrophobic repelling. The concept is neither new nor exclusive to Rust-Oleum, though previously it’s been used only for industrial applications. For a coating to be considered superhydrophobic, it must repel water molecules at an angle of 150 degrees or more, which is three times the contact angle of an untreated surface. A wide contact angle forces water droplets to form into spheres and then glide off the surface. Conversely, a narrow contact angle flattens the droplet so that is stays put and saturates the surface. A waxed surface, for example, repels water at a 90 degree contact angle. A non-stick coating on a frying pan works at around 110 degrees. NeverWet repels at an 165-degree angle.