Environmental Factors in Stress Corrosion Cracking and Anodic Polarization of Zirconium in Methanol-HCl Solutions

The effects of the environmental factors, aqueous HCl, anhydrous HCl, and water, on stress corrosion cracking (SCC) and anodic polarization of annealed zirconium in methanol-HCl solutions have been studied and the corresponding correlations are brought out. The occurrence of minimum time to failure by SCC, corresponding to maximum susceptibility, at a concentration of 0.4 Vol% aqueous HCl has been shown to be due to the coexistence of active and passive states. The activating and passivating species are Cl⁻ ion and water, respectively.