Influence of Hydrogen on Steel Components for Clean Energy

The influence of hydrogen on the mechanical properties of four, medium-strength, commercial, quenched-and-temped steels has been studied using the linearly increasing stress test (LIST) combined with cathodic hydrogen charging. The relationship was established between the equivalent hydrogen pressure and the hydrogen charging overpotential during cathodic hydrogen charging, though the use of electrochemical permeation experiments and thermal desorption spectroscopy. The cathodic hydrogen charging conditions were equivalent to testing in gaseous hydrogen at hydrogen fugacities of over a thousand bar. Under these hydrogen-charging conditions, there was no effect of hydrogen up to the yield stress. There was an influence of hydrogen on the final fracture, which occurred at the same stress as for the steels tested in air. The influence of hydrogen was on the details of the final fracture. In some cases, brittle fractures initiated by hydrogen, or DHF: Decohesive hydrogen fracture, initiated the final fracture of the specimen, which was largely by ductile micro-void coalescence (MVC), but did include some brittle fisheye fractures. Each fisheye was surrounded by MVC. This corresponds to MF: Mixed fracture, wherein a hydrogen microfracture mechanism (i.e., that producing the fisheyes) competed with the ductile MVC fracture. The fisheyes were associated with alumina oxide inclusion, which indicated that these features would be less for a cleaner steel. There was no subcritical crack growth. There was essentially no influence of hydrogen on ductility for the hydrogen conditions studied. At applied stress amplitudes above the threshold stress, fatigue initiation, for low cycle fatigue, occurred at a lower number of cycles with increasing hydrogen fugacity and increasing stress amplitude. This was caused by a decrease in the fatigue initiation period, and by an increase in the crack growth rate. In the presence of hydrogen, there was flat transgranular fracture with vague striations with some intergranular fracture at lower stresses. Mechanical overload occurred when the fatigue crack reached the critical length. There was no significant influence of hydrogen on the final fracture.