Influence Of Particle Velocities And Impact Angles On The Erosion Mechanisms Of AISI 1018 Steel

¹Center for Advanced Materials, Qatar University, 2713 Doha, Qatar

²Department of Metallurgical and Materials Engineering, Faculty of Petroleum and Mining Engineering, Suez University, 43721 Suez, Egypt

Adv. Mater. Lett., 2015, 6 (7), pp 653-659

DOI: 10.5185/amlett.2015.5645

Publication Date (Web): Jul 12, 2015

Copyright © IAAM-VBRI Press

E-mail: adel.mohamed@qu.edu.qa, madel@uqac.ca

Abstract

Failure of oil and gas pipeline due to solid particles entrainment has been a great concern to the petroleum industry. Erosion is the gradual material removal of pipeline materials due to solid particle impingement and results in unacceptable damage to the pipeline steel material surface. Because this process is difficult to investigate during operation, laboratory simulation test provides some insight. In this study, series of erosion tests were carried out to investigate the influence of particle velocity and impact angle on the erosion mechanism of AISI 1018 steel. Sand blaster erosion machine was used as the test equipment while the particle velocity and impact angle were ranged from 20 to 80 m/s and between 30 and 90° respectively. The results showed that at 90° impact angle, ploughing mechanism was operative, while material removal through low angle cutting was the dominant mechanism at lower impact angle during the erosion of AISI 1018 steel. Mainly, embedment of aluminium oxide particles on the target steel surface, micro–cutting, low angle cutting, pitting and ploughing were observed for low impact angle tests. It was suggested that scratches, cuttings and ploughing observed on some failed oil and gas pipeline steels could be attributed to erosion mechanism.

Keywords

AISI 1018 steel, oxide particles, impact angle, particles velocity, erosion mechanisms.