The Susceptibility of Austenitic Stainless Steels to Stress-Corrosion Cracking

Abstract

Occasionally in the application of the austenitic chromium-nickel steels to corrosive conditions, failures have occurred by cracking without serious general over-all attack of the metal. As pointed out by Hoyt and Scheil(1), and by Scheil, et al.(2) as well as by Hodge and Miller(3), the stress-corrosion failures that have occurred have been limited in number, and have taken place only when the steels were exposed to certain corrodents. These investigators have stated that while stress-corrosion cracking can be intergranular in nature and originate at the grain boundaries of the austenitic chromium-nickel steels, it can also take place in transgranular fashion. They have shown that the cracking may be either initiated at the grain boundaries and may propagate along grain boundaries for some distance and then suddenly extend across grains, or it may begin in a transgranular fashion and suddenly proceed along grain boundaries until the cracking stops. Their data further show that when austenitic stainless steel is subject to intergranular attack, stress will concentrate and cause cracking in service.

Stress corrosion cracking and corrosion fatigue

“…The Copson curve presented in Fig. Similar improvement in SCC resistance with Ni has been observed by other researchers [ 109,148]. However, before Copson, there were other studies that illustrated a similar effect of Ni on the susceptibility of Fe-Cr-Ni alloys to SCC.…”

Marine Atmospheric SCC of Unsensitized Stainless Steel Rock Climbing Protection

“…This conclusion is substantiated by the fact that the unloaded, exemplar hanger cracked rapidly in only 4.5 h when exposed to the boiling MgCl 2 , a short time when compared to times-to-failure for 321 specimens in boiling 42% MgCl 2 [22]. Technical literature from as far back as the late 1800s clearly shows that residual stresses from metal forming operations are sufficient to cause SCC [7,[38][39][40][41]. The hanger was heavily cold-worked as shown by the 350 Hv of the exemplar hanger (approximately 50% cold work) [42].…”

Mechanism of Stress Corrosion of Austenitic Stainless Steels in High-Temperature Chloride Waters

“…Some authors indicate that the minis= stresses required for cracking are on the order of yield (7,8), Vhile other investigators indicate that stresses as low as 3,000 to 10,000 psi (9, 2) will produce cracking. Threshold stresses for cracking have been studied in detail by K "or and lines (10, 3-1).…”