Oxidation and corrosion mechanism of steel alloys and inconel 600 alloy in liquid–lead-bismuth eutectic

Abstract EN

The alloys used in this study were two types pf stainless steels (304SS and 316 SS), low alloy steel (Type T22-ASTM) and Inconel 600 alloy` (nickel base super alloy).

The oxidation mechanism were studied for three steel alloys and for inconel 600 in liquid Pb-Bi eutectic (LBE) in the temperature range 450- 550 oC using stagnant test.

A model based on the experiments of Cr oxidation at high temperature with scale vaporization was applied to the present oxidation process by replacing the vaporization rate with the mass-transfer-corrosion rate.

The results indicate that all steel alloys showed an oxidation / corrosion behavior.

The oxidation kinetics is parabolic and the corrosion kinetics is linear.

The parabolic oxidation rate constant are of the following order (Kp) 304SS (Kp) 316SS > (Kp) low alloy steel.

The scale-removal-rate constants Kr by mass transfer corrosion are of the following order (Kr) inconel > (Kr) 316SS > (Kr) 304SS.

The weight loss increases with increasing Ni content in the steel alloys.