Abstract
Corrosion fatigue crack growth rates are reported for HY80 and HY130 steels in natural sea water. The data were collected using deep-side-grooved tension specimens to simulate plane strain conditions. The cycling frequency was 0.008 Hz and all tests were performed under potentiostatic control. For HY80 at -700 and -950 mV(sce) and HY130 at -950 mY, the corrosion fatigue cracks grew faster in sea water than in air if the net section stress on the uncracked ligament was low. At high net section stresses the corrosion fatigue crack growth rates were less than the reference air data. Additionally, a threshold stress intensity amplitude for the initiation of crack growth existed that increased with increasing net section stress. The implications of these results are discussed as well as the validity of the deep-side-grooved test procedure. Data were also obtained for the steels which implied that the role of the environment was to produce hydrogen-assisted growth rather than dissolution-assisted propagation.
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