Quantification of corrosion phenomena in plastic processing machines

Area of Science:

• Materials Science
• Corrosion Science
• Polymer Composites

Background:

• Metallic material corrosion is a significant concern in various industrial applications.
• Understanding corrosion mechanisms in polymer-based composite systems is crucial for material longevity.
• Existing methods for assessing corrosion can be destructive or lack detailed chemical information.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the corrosion behavior of metallic materials within model polymer systems.
• To evaluate and compare various analytical techniques for corrosion assessment.
• To identify a reliable, nondestructive method for quantifying corrosive attack.

Main Methods:

• Processing of polyethylene, polyphenylene sulfide, and glass-fibre-reinforced polyphenylene sulfide.
• Utilized scanning electron microscopy, electron-probe microanalysis, secondary-ion mass spectrometry, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, and grazing-incidence X-ray diffraction.
• Focused on grazing-incidence X-ray diffraction (IFe-O/IFe ratio) as a nondestructive measure.

Main Results:

• Grazing-incidence X-ray diffraction proved to be the method of choice for nondestructive corrosion measurement.
• The reproducibility of the overall procedure ranged from 6 to 13% (relative).
• Oxides were identified as the main corrosion products, with formation extent proportional to elapsed time.

Conclusions:

• Grazing-incidence X-ray diffraction offers a reliable, quantitative, and nondestructive approach to assess metallic material corrosion in polymer composites.
• The study establishes a methodology for understanding corrosion kinetics and product formation in these materials.
• Material composition, time, and atmosphere influence the extent of oxide formation.