Effects of water on the SCC of low carbon steel in ethanolic media

Abstract

Purpose – This paper aims to determine the effect of water on the SCC of low carbon steel in ethanol in the absence of supporting salts. Design/methodology/approach – Slow strain rate test was done to determine SCC susceptibility. Fractured samples were examined using optical microscopy and scanning electron microscopy. Findings – While the results demonstrated that water alone had no effect on the SCC susceptibility of low carbon steel in ethanol, 2.5 volume per cent moisture gave indications of cracking tendencies. Originality/value – With South Africa and the world over turning to bioethanol and ethanol blended fuels as a means of reducing its carbon foot print, there are concerns over the corrosive nature of ethanol on common engineering metals like low carbon steels.

Stress corrosion cracking of microalloyed pipeline steel in biofuels E-10 and E-85

“…Furthermore, we observed the presence of a spherical nonmetallic inclusion (Figure 10(c)), with a diameter of about 4 μm, which is characteristic of this type of steel. The fractographs presented in Figures 10(a)–(e) reveal that the failure in the steels in both media (E-10 and E-85) resulted from a ductile fracture, which is consistent with the absence of SCC [4,34,35]. Figure 11 shows the EDS analysis of this particle whose composition can be 2CaO.6Al2O3 type, [36,37].…”