On loading mode (I, III) technique as a means of determination of crack growth mechanism in Stress-corrosion cracking

1989 ◽  
Vol 40 (6) ◽  
pp. 369-373
Author(s):  
V. A. Marichev
Author(s):  
Douglas A. Scarth ◽  
Katsumasa Miyazaki ◽  
Kunio Hasegawa ◽  
Warren H. Bamford

Acceptance Standards for flaws in piping are provided in Section XI of the ASME B&PV Code to permit acceptance of relatively small flaws without the need to perform an analytical evaluation. The Acceptance Standards are based on maintaining large margins against failure, and are based on the assumption that flaw growth will be insignificant. The assumption of a small amount of flaw growth is justified when fatigue crack growth is the only crack growth mechanism. However, when stress corrosion cracking is operative, flaw growth could be significant. This conclusion was illustrated by comparison of the crack growth results due to fatigue and stress corrosion cracking in Pressurized Water Reactor (PWR), and Boiling Water Reactor (BWR), coolant environments. For this reason, IWB-3514 of Section XI prohibits use of the Acceptance Standards for planar surface-connected flaws that are detected in piping materials that are susceptible to stress corrosion cracking and are in reactor coolant environments. As part of a recent Code revision to include new Acceptance Standards tables for flaws in piping, restrictions on use of the Acceptance Standards of IWB-3514 have been refined and clarified. The recent Code revision now specifies different restrictions and requirements for use of the Acceptance Standards for such planar surface-connected flaws detected by preservice and inservice examination. In addition, similar restrictions have been imposed on use of the new Acceptance Standards for such planar surface-connected flaws in Class 2 piping in IWC-3514 of Section XI. The technical basis for the restrictions and requirements for use of the Acceptance Standards for planar surface-connected flaws in piping materials that are susceptible to stress corrosion cracking is provided in this paper.


Author(s):  
Frank Y. Cheng

A thermodynamic model was developed to determine the interactions of hydrogen, stress and anodic dissolution at the crack-tip during near-neutral pH stress corrosion cracking in pipelines. By analyzing the free-energy of the steel in the presence and absence of hydrogen and stress, it is demonstrated that a synergism of hydrogen and stress promotes the cracking of the steel. The enhanced hydrogen concentration in the stressed steel significantly accelerates the crack growth. The quantitative prediction of the crack growth rate in near-neutral pH environment is based on the determination of the effect of hydrogen on the anodic dissolution rate in the absence of stress, the effect of stress on the anodic dissolution rate in the absence of hydrogen, the synergistic effect of hydrogen and stress on the anodic dissolution rate at the crack-tip and the effect of the variation of hydrogen concentration on the anodic dissolution rate.


Author(s):  
Frederick W. Brust ◽  
Paul M. Scott

There have been incidents recently where cracking has been observed in the bi-metallic welds that join the hot leg to the reactor pressure vessel nozzle. The hot leg pipes are typically large diameter, thick wall pipes. Typically, an inconel weld metal is used to join the ferritic pressure vessel steel to the stainless steel pipe. The cracking, mainly confined to the inconel weld metal, is caused by corrosion mechanisms. Tensile weld residual stresses, in addition to service loads, contribute to PWSCC (Primary Water Stress Corrosion Cracking) crack growth. In addition to the large diameter hot leg pipe, cracking in other piping components of different sizes has been observed. For instance, surge lines and spray line cracking has been observed that has been attributed to this degradation mechanism. Here we present some models which are used to predict the PWSCC behavior in nuclear piping. This includes weld model solutions of bimetal pipe welds along with an example calculation of PWSCC crack growth in a hot leg. Risk based considerations are also discussed.


2020 ◽  
Vol 2020 ◽  
pp. 1-10
Author(s):  
Rehmat Bashir ◽  
He Xue ◽  
Rui Guo ◽  
Yueqi Bi ◽  
Muhammad Usman

The structural integrity analysis of nuclear power plants (NPPs) is an essential procedure since the age of NPPs is increasing constantly while the number of new NPPs is still limited. Low-cyclic fatigue (LCF) and stress corrosion cracking (SSC) are the two main causes of failure in light-water reactors (LWRs). In the last few decades, many types of research studies have been conducted on these two phenomena separately, but the joint effect of these two mechanisms on the same crack has not been discussed yet though these two loads exist simultaneously in the LWRs. SCC is mainly a combination of the loading, the corrosive medium, and the susceptibility of materials while the LCF depends upon the elements such as compression, moisture, contact, and weld. As it is an attempt to combine SCC and LCF, this research focuses on the joint effect of SCC and LCF loading on crack propagation. The simulations are carried out using extended finite element method (XFEM) separately, for the SCC and LCF, on an identical crack. In the case of SCC, da/dt(mm/sec) is converted into da/dNScc (mm/cycle), and results are combined at the end. It has been observed that the separately calculated results for SCC da/dNScc and LCF da/dNm of crack growth rate are different from those of joint/overall effect,  da/dNom. By applying different SCC loads, the overall crack growth is measured as SCC load becomes the main cause of failure in LWRs in some cases particularly in the presence of residual stresses.


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