The Effect of Oversize Solute Additions on the Irradiation-Assisted Stress Corrosion Cracking Resistance of Austenitic Stainless Steels

Solute additions of zirconium are believed to decrease RIS and dislocation density through point defect trapping and recombination, which in turn reduces grain boundary sensitization and IGSCC. In this work, the effect of zirconium on the microstructure, microchemistry, hardening and IGSCC behavior of 316SS doped with zirconium to levels of 0.31 and 0.45 wt% was studied. These alloys were then irradiated with 3.2 MeV protons to doses up to 7 dpa at a temperature of 400 C. Zr additions had relatively little effect on radiation hardening. Dislocation densities were reduced and average sizes slightly increased for the +Zr alloys relative to the 316SS. Although a low amount of swelling was seen in 316SS at 3 dpa, no voids were observed in either of the +Zr alloys at 3 or 7 dpa. The difference in RIS of Cr and Ni between 316SS and 316+LoZr at 3 dpa was negligible, though RIS for 316+HiZr was considerably less than 316+LoZr at 7 dpa. The link between the oversize solute addition of Zr and its effect on IASCC shows that although the percent strain to failure increased substantially for 316+LoZr compared to the 316SS, cracking behavior was substantially worse as the number of cracks and total crack length was increased by more than an order of magnitude