Stress corrosion crack detection in alloy 600 in high temperature caustic.

Abstract

Alloy 600, the material used for pressurized water reactor steam generator tubing, is susceptible to environmentally assisted stress corrosion cracking. Intergranular stress corrosion cracking (IGSCC) attacks the tubes in areas of high residual stress, and in crevice regions. No method has been successfully developed to monitor steam generator tubing in-situ for crack initiation and growth. Essentially all available published IGSCC crack growth data for alloy 600 is based on non-tubing material. Although it is very likely that the current data base is applicable to tubing processing, differences between tube and other geometries make a comparison between tubing and other data important for verification purposes. However, obtaining crack initiation and growth data from tubing is difficult due to the geometry and the thin wall thickness