The Issue of Aircraft Corrosion - Literature review Example

Crack nucleation is affected by different environmental, absence or presence of clad material, and loading conditions. Findings by SRI International (1999) suggest that crack nucleation is normally slower in bare material than in clad material. In bare material, crack nucleated at constituent particles, whereas it nucleated at crystallographic pit colonies, in clad material. Fatigue on the metal occurs because of the load spectrum and varying operating conditions. Under the controlled lab conditions, changing the environment from a vacuum (10-6 torr) to lab air resulted in an accelerated rate of crack growth rate.

According to SRI International, a localized type of corrosion is known as pitting. It results in cavities on the affected material. In addition, pits are a source of crack development. Elongated pits occurring as a result of constituent particle erosion often lead to nucleated fatigue cracks. Alclad is a material formed by metallurgically bonding high-strength aluminum alloy with a high purity aluminum. The latter forms a surface layer over the alloy core.