THE INFLUENCE OF COMPOSITION UPON SURFACE DEGRADATION AND STRESS CORROSION CRACKING OF THE Ni-Cr-Mo ALLOYS IN WET HYDROFLUORIC ACID

摘要

At concentrations below 60 percent, wet hydrofluoric acid (HF) is extremely corrosive to steels, stainless steels and reactive metals, such as titanium, zirconium, and tantalum. In fact, only a few metallic materials will withstand wet HF at temperatures above ambient. Among these are the nickelcopper (Ni-Cu) and nickel-chromium-molybdenum (Ni-Cr-Mo) alloys. Previous work has shown that, even with these materials, there are complicating factors. For example, under certain conditions, internal attack and stress corrosion cracking (SCC) are possible with the Ni-Cr-Mo alloys, and the Ni-Cu materials can suffer intergranular attack when exposed to wet HF vapors. The purpose of this work was to study further the response of the Ni-Cr-Mo alloys to HF, in particular their external corrosion rates, susceptibility to internal attack and susceptibility to HF-induced SCC, as a function of alloy composition. As a side experiment, one of the alloys was tested in two microstructural conditions, i.e. solution annealed (the usual condition for materials of this type) and long-range ordered (this being a means of strengthening the alloy in question). The study of external corrosion rates over wide ranges of concentration and temperature revealed a strong beneficial influence of molybdenum content. However, tungsten, which is used as a partial replacement for molybdenum in some Ni-Cr-Mo alloys, appears to render the alloys more prone to internal attack. With regard to HF-induced SCC of the Ni-Cr-Mo alloys, this study suggests that only certain alloys (i.e., those containing tungsten) exhibit classical SCC. It was also discovered that high external corrosion rates inhibit HF-induced SCC, presumably due to rapid progression of the external attack front. With regard to the effects of long-range ordering, these were only evident at the highest test temperatures, where the ordered structure exhibited much higher external corrosion rates than the annealed structure.