The effect of iodine content and specimen orientation on stress corrosion crack growth rate in Zircaloy-4

Abstract

Abstract The influence of specimen orientation, stress intensity factor ( K I ), and iodine concentration on the iodine-induced stress corrosion cracking growth rates in Zircaloy-4 was investigated in iodized methanol solutions at ambient temperature. When K I is lower than 20 MPa.m 1/2 , the intergranular and mixed intergranular/transgranular crack propagation rates increase linearly with ( K I − K I,th ), K I,th being the onset of propagation stress intensity factor. The increase in iodine content induces an increase of the crack growth rate for a given K I , and a decrease of the K I,th . The specimen orientation is a second order parameter. A crack propagation law, depending on iodine content, is proposed.