Stainless Steel Selection Avoid Localised Forms of Corrosion

With appropriate stainless steel grade selection will give good corrosion resistance performance. However, the choice of an inappropriate grade can result in failure by perforation or catastrophic cracking in shorter times than failure by uniform corrosion in 'lower resistant' alloys such as ordinary carbon steel.

Selection of the appropriate grade of stainless steel is a balance between attaining the appropriate degree of corrosion resistance whilst minimising cost. An appreciation of the possible failure mechanisms does help avoid unnecessary and possibly costly failures.

To help in the selection of the correct grade, corrosion table are listed in references such as the Corrosion Resistance Table . Here a wide range of chemical environments (concentration of chemical species and temperature) are listed. These indicate corrosion rates by weight loss and also give an indication of the additional risk of localized corrosion such as pitting corrosion or stress corrosion cracking SCC.

Other programs have also been designed to predict the likelihood of crevice corrosion failure in chloride waters 

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