This research examines the prediction of stress-corrosion crack growth rates in low-alloy steels exposed to carbonate/bicarbonate environments, which are believed to cause failures of buried natural gas pipelines. Of particular concern was the very early stage of crack propagation where the crack are still of microscopic size. Data on crack growth were collected both from laboratory experiments and from examination of field failures. The analysis of laboratory specimens concerned the relationship between crack growth and the applied stress cycle. The field specimen analysis examined the crack length distributions found in colonies of cracks. The results of these analyses support the conclusion that stress-corrosion crack growth can be reliably predicted from linear-elastic-fracture-mechanics approaches. These approaches may be extended to the early stages of crack propagation.

Subject
Pits, Crack growth, Piping, Stress intensity, Crack propagation, Stress cracking, Stress, Crack depth, Defects, Crack length, Steel, Carbonate stress corrosion cracking, Stress corrosion cracking
© 1992 Association for Materials Protection and Performance (AMPP). All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of AMPP. Positions and opinions advanced in this work are those of the author(s) and not necessarily those of AMPP. Responsibility for the content of the work lies solely with the author(s).
1992
Association for Materials Protection and Performance (AMPP)
You do not currently have access to this content.