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Arid deserts effects on bare Carbon Steel or Corten
2

Arid deserts effects on bare Carbon Steel or Corten

Arid deserts effects on bare Carbon Steel or Corten

(OP)
How will an arid desert such as that in Southern California, effect bare carbon steel(ASTM A36) or Corten A (ASTM A 588) weathering steel?

RE: Arid deserts effects on bare Carbon Steel or Corten

For bare carbon steel (unprotected) maybe a layer of flash rust and for Corten, no effect.

RE: Arid deserts effects on bare Carbon Steel or Corten

I have always heard that steel will not rust if humidity in the air is below 30-40%
 

RE: Arid deserts effects on bare Carbon Steel or Corten

(OP)
Thank you for your responses they are much appreciated.  

RE: Arid deserts effects on bare Carbon Steel or Corten

Living in SoCal Desert, not far from a couple of the big aircraft parks I can state that carbon steel does still rust though not as fast.  Some of the big tanks and old corrugated buildings etc show considerable corrosion, though as suggested above if does appear to be mainly cosmetic.

Posting guidelines FAQ731-376: Eng-Tips.com Forum Policies http://eng-tips.com/market.cfm? (probably not aimed specifically at you)
What is Engineering anyway: FAQ1088-1484: In layman terms, what is "engineering"?

RE: Arid deserts effects on bare Carbon Steel or Corten

the corrosion rate is a function of many factors
like presence of Atmospheric contaminants (SO2, HCl, organic acids), distance from the sea...but usually the corrosion rate in a arid desert is very low for carbon steel and weathering steel

this is from a paper of NPL:

"Weathering" or "slow-rusting" low-alloy steels containing 0.2-0.3% copper with minor additions of other elements corrode at about 3 1 to ¼ the rate of plain steels.

In the driest atmospheres, e.g.at Khartoum, the rate can be as low as 0.003 mm/year.

http://www.npl.co.uk/upload/pdf/atmospheric_corrosion.pdf


this corrosion model by corrdefense is a useful tool to predict atmospheric corrosion:

http://www.corrdefense.org/Academia%20Government%20and%20Industry/Environmental%20Corrosion%20Model%20user%20instructions.pdf

http://www.corrdefense.org/Academia%20Government%20and%20Industry/Environmental%20Corrosion%20Model.zip

http://www.corrosionist.com/corrosion_control_methods.htm



hope this help

S

Corrosion Prevention & Corrosion Control
 

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