Crevice Corrosion of Nickel Alloy 625 in an Ocean Water Environment: New Insight into the Crevice Environment

Abstract

Nickel alloy 625 is widely used in marine applications due to its excellent corrosion resistance when exposed to highly oxidizing and reducing environments. However, nickel alloy 625 has been found to be susceptible to localized corrosion when crevices with a large aspect ratio (depth/gap) are exposed to seawater. In this study, two different electrochemical techniques were used to evaluate the mechanisms of crevice corrosion in nickel alloy 625: potentiostatic polarization of remote crevice assemblies (RCAs) exposed to ASTM artificial ocean water and potentiodynamic polarization curves in simulated critical crevice solutions (CCSs). From the electrochemical response of the RCAs, i.e. current vs. time curves, it was found that crevice corrosion damage under potentiostatic conditions occurred in three stages: Stage (I) CCS development, stage (II) crevice corrosion under IR control, and stage (III) crevice corrosion under diffusion control. It was also found that the CCS formed near the crevice tip and moved toward the crevice mouth. Once the CCS reached a critical distance from the mouth, presumably IR*, the corrosion rate drastically increased and severe damage occurred. During the RCA experiments, light green deposits around the outside edge of the RCA were found. When the crevices were opened after the test, additional corrosion products were found. For short exposure times, dark green and brown corrosion products were found spread out over the etching damage while at longer exposure times, accumulation of dark brown corrosion products were found closer to the crevice mouth. Energy Dispersive Spectroscopy (EDS) analysis showed that the crevice corrosion products formed inside the crevice were rich in Mo, Nb, and O, suggesting the possible formation of Mo and Nb oxides. The crevice corrosion products outside of the crevice were rich in Ni, Cr, Fe, Mo and O. The behavior of 625 in the CCS was characterized using potentiodynamic polarization in concentrated metal salt solutions prepared by dissolving NiCl2∙6H2O, CrCl3∙6H2O, FeCl2∙4H2O, MoCl3, and NbCl5 salts in deionized water at concentrations ranging from 3 to 5 molal. It was found that Mo and Nb content increased the current density of the active peak. The properties of these simulated CCSs were determined using thermodynamic calculations via the OLI Stream Analyzer software. Specifically, OLI software was used to predict the precipitation products and solution pH at 25°C. The predictions were used to compare the polarization data generated with the traditional simulated CSS using HCl base solutions.