Controlling End-Grain Corrosion of Austenitic Stainless Steels

SS 304L is widely used as a structural material in applications handling nitric acid such as nuclear fuel processing plants and nuclear waste management facilities. Bar, wire, and tubular products of this material are especially susceptible to end-grain corrosion in nitric acid environment. Such an attack takes place on the tubular and forged surfaces that are perpendicular to the hot-working direction and occurs as localized pitting type attack. This study shows that the possible reasons for the directional nature of end-grain attack are the manganese sulfide inclusions aligned along the hot-working direction and/or segregation of chromium along the flow lines during the fabrication stage itself. It has been shown in this study that controlled solution annealing, laser surface remelting, and weld overlay can be used to avoid/minimize end-grain corrosion. Different annealing heat-treatments were carried out on two heats of SS 304L tube and susceptibility to corrosion was measured by ASTM A 262 practice C and electrochemical potentiokinetic reactivation (EPR) test. Solution annealing at 950 °C for 90 min has been shown to increase the resistance to end-grain corrosion. Laser surface remelting using continuous wave CO2 laser under argon shield and weld deposition (overlay) using SS 308L material were done on the end faces of the tubes. These samples were completely resistant to end-grain corrosion in nitric acid environments.