Will finite-element analysis find its way to the design against stress corrosion cracking?

The advancements in the design methodology of stress corrosion cracking (SCC) have led to the recent developments in finite-element predictions of electrochemical conditions within cracks and crevices, together with finite-element predictions of the mechanical crack-tip loading, and a constitutive law describing the material–environment interface at the crack tip. Such a design methodology consists of first calculating the electrochemical conditions and the mechanical loading at the crack tip, and then determining the crack propagation rate via a mechanico-electrochemical diagram. The approach employed for SCC of Type 304 stainless steel in high-temperature water, makes the use of finite-element precalculated electrochemical crack-tip conditions, an analytically calculated mechanical crack-tip loading, and a mechanico-electrochemical diagram describing the constitutive behavior of the interface. The constitutive behavior can be obtained experimentally and, in the future, it might be calculated by multi-scale modeling. It is anticipated that one can construct the MEC diagram from experimentally obtained crack growth rates in well-defined experiments. It is expected that this will reduce the variability in experimental crack growth rate results and tie together crack growth rates obtained on various crack growth specimen types.