The effect of alloy composition on the localized corrosion behavior of nickel-chromium-molybdenum alloys

Ni-Cr-Mo alloys are one of the most versatile Ni-based alloys because they resist corrosion in a variety of environments. This versatility is due to the combination of Cr and Mo additions to the alloy. These alloying elements complement each other in producing a highly corrosion resistant alloy. The concentration of the elements in the alloy establishes the corrosion behavior of these alloys.;In this study, Ni-Cr-Mo alloys with varying composition were studied using electrochemical methods. The dependency of pitting corrosion on the alloy chemistry was captured in empirical models that roughly rank the pitting susceptibility of the Ni-Cr-Mo alloys studied. The same type of model was also constructed for capturing the effect of alloy composition on the repassivation potential. It was found that these models were specific in terms of alloying element effects on the type of environments exposed to the alloys particularly, pH and temperature.;The addition of chromium was shown to contribute to the higher pitting potential on the Ni-Cr-Mo alloys in neural chloride environment while molybdenum was dominant in acidified chloride solutions. In regards to the repassivation potential, both chromium and molybdenum affect the repassivation potential more or less evenly in neutral pH solutions. Under low pH high temperature conditions, molybdenum content has a greater effect on the repassivation potential value than chromium.;Stabilization of localized corrosion is increasingly difficult as alloying element content increases. However, metastable pitting occurs in most alloys and the metastable pitting behavior of several Ni-Cr-Mo alloys was studied through potentiostatic analysis. Higher chromium and molybdenum contents decreased the metastable pitting incidence; although, the effect of Mo content was observed to be more dominant. Molybdenum additions were found to suppress the growth of the metastable pits. The growth rate of the fastest growing pits was also reduced by increasing the Mo content. Chromium affects the metastable pits during the repassivation process where higher Cr content produces faster repassivation rates.;The last part of the study addressed the role of alloying additions on the repassivation behavior of Ni-Cr-Mo alloys. Alloys with similar Mo content but higher Cr or higher Ni contents exhibited higher repassivation potentials. Higher Mo-containing alloys were shown to be very corrosion resistant since they did not experience any localized corrosion after rigorous polarization tests given that enough Cr was present. The repassivation potential was determined by the surface overpotential and thermodynamic contribution. XPS analysis found evidence of Cr(III) oxide as the main passivating agent. Molybdenum species primarily Mo(VI) and Cr(III) hydroxide were detected on the crevice attack area and on layer of films that formed from transpassive dissolution of higher Cr or higher Mo-containing alloys.