Assessment of Fire Damage to 321 Stainless Steel Equipment in a Chemical Unit

摘要

In the present work, the mechanical properties of 321 stainless steel pressure equipments exposed to an accident fire in a chemical unit were investigated. The performance and micro structure of this material were described by chemical compositions analysis, tensile test, scanning electron microscopy (SEM) equipped with energy dispersive spectroscopy (EDS) and X-ray diffraction (XRD). The experiment results showed that the mechanical properties of the material were degraded. The grains on the external surface of the fracture became coarse. These results indicated that serious damage to 321 stainless steel had been induced by extreme heat of the fire and this pressure vessel could not be used anymore.