Wooden take-off board is easy to crack, deform, discolor, and decay when it is used outdoors, which not only increases maintenance costs but also reduces its service life. Multifunctional coatings with UV-resistant, water-repellent, and flame-retardant properties were successfully obtained on the surface of a wooden take-off board substrate by spray-assisted layer-by-layer self-assembly. The coatings consisted of positively-charged chitosan, Al (OH)3, and negatively-charged sodium phytate through electrostatic adsorption several times. The treated wood exhibited high UV resistance, and the color remained constant after 720 hours of ultraviolet irradiation. The wettability of the wood surface after treatment became superhydrophobic, with initial static contact angles as high as 140°. In addition, limiting oxygen index and air exposure combustion tests were used to verify that chitosan, sodium phytate, and aluminum hydroxide could synergistically confer significant fire resistance to modified wood.

Fire-retardant chitosan/sodium phytate/MgO nanoparticle (CH/SP/nano-MgO) coatings were loaded on a wood substrate via electrostatic layer-by-layer self-assembly and characterized by scanning electron microscopy and energy-dispersive spectrometry. The flammability and thermal degradation of the original wood and wood samples treated with chitosan, chitosan/sodium phytate, chitosan/sodium phytate/MgO nanoparticles were studied by limiting oxygen index (LOI), exposure combustion experiments and thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), respectively. The CH/SP/nano-MgO coating served as an intumescent fire-retardant system that created a physical protection cover and exhibited the best fire retardant performance. The LOI value was 30.2% and required approximately 16–17 s to self-extinguish when exposed to air. The TGA curves also showed that char formation protected the wood from combustion.

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