Initiation of PWSCC of weld alloy 182

International audienceEven if Alloy 182 is usually exhibiting a high susceptibility to cracking in the laboratory, the field experience did not reveal to date a significant susceptibility to primary water stress corrosion cracking (PWSCC) in pressurized water reactors (PWRs), when the welds have been perfectly stress relieved. However, recently, an increasing number of cracks have been reported in the USA, Sweden and Japan on Alloy 182 and a few cases on Alloy 82. This paper addresses the work on initiation of PWSCC engaged at EDF R&D. The main objective is to calibrate an engineering model to predict the time to initiate IGSCC vs. temperature and loading for 182 weld metals having a high susceptibility to PWSCC