(Corrosion Division H. H. Uhlig Award Address) Corrosion of (Nominally and Notionally) Reactive Engineering Alloys

摘要

The requirement of many industries to utilise engineering alloys that are lightweight is increasing as a result of rapidly advancing technologies (such as portable electronics), and due to environmental requirements (such as the need to reduce emissions). Paradoxically, the so-called 'light alloys' are also amongst the most reactive of the engineering alloys. In particular, the lightest of the commodity engineering alloys, namely aluminium and magnesium alloys, continue to present significant issues with respect to corrosion. The persistence of corrosion related issues has been assured by the increasing utilisation of materials in previously unconsidered environments/scenarios, and from the timescales required to fully understand the durability of newly developed alloys. Herein, a number of 'materials' factors, from the microstructural to the atomic scale, that contribute to corrosion of light alloys will be presented. In particular, the development of increasingly corrosion resistant magnesium alloys will be discussed, with a view to rationalising so-called 'dynamic passivity' as a means for providing engineering materials with kinetic stability.