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Materials Performance

From its inception, the CANMET Materials Technology Laboratory (CANMET-MTL) has been involved in assuring the integrity of structures used in the energy industry – notably pipelines, marine vessels, and offshore structures. This has entailed the development of in-depth capabilities in mechanical testing and corrosion control, and extensive involvement in the writing of national and international standards.

Expertise and facilities are available for full structural integrity analyses, including static and dynamic toughness testing and finite element analysis, and for corrosion assessment and control, including hydrogen and H2S interaction, erosion/wear, and high-temperature corrosion.

Competencies

Mechanical testing: Conventional mechanical testing (tensile, fatigue, impact) and specialized competence in fracture mechanics assessment of fatigue resistance and toughness (including instrumented impact using pendulum and drop-tower facilities as well as quasi-static methods).

Pipe testing: Full-scale testing of linepipe for stress-corrosion cracking (SCC), fatigue, and corrosion fatigue.

Stress measurement and crack detection: Expertise in advanced methods of residual stress measurement by hole drilling and X-ray diffraction, and electromagnetic acoustic transduction (EMAT) crack detection.

Modelling: Competence in finite element analysis, especially related to fracture mechanics, and simulation/modelling of thermomechanical processes and microstructural change; in-house computer software for addressing a wide range of corrosion/materials degradation problems and critical crack size calculations.

Corrosion control: Expertise in risk assessment, materials selection, coatings, cathodic protection, corrosion inhibitors, microbiologically influenced corrosion (MIC), H2S corrosion, hydrogen-induced cracking (HIC), stress-oriented hydrogen-induced cracking (SOHIC), sulphide stress corrosion cracking (SSSC), hydrogen embrittlement, SCC, erosion/wear, high-temperature corrosion, corrosion monitoring and failure investigation.

Major Facilities

Mechanical testing:

  • 100 kN, 500 kN, and 1000 kN universal servohydraulic machines
  • extensive impact testing equipment (instrumented drop-weight towers and pendulum impact machines)
  • equipment for fracture toughness and fatigue testing
  • computation facilities for finite element stress analysis
  • equipment for residual stress measurement by X-ray diffraction and hole drilling

Corrosion testing:

  • equipment for standardized testing (ASTM, NACE, API)
  • electrochemical testing and evaluation equipment including potentiodynamic polarization, polarization resistance, potentiostatic/galvanostatic polarization, electrochemical impedance spectroscopy, and electrochemical noise
  • corrosion testing in a variety of environments (atmospheric testing, salt spray exposure, temperature/humidity exposure, cyclic heating and cooling, fatigue cycling, and customized environments of pressure, temperature, stress, and gas)

For further information contact:

Dr. W.R. Tyson
Group Leader
Telephone: (613) 992-9573
Facsimile: (613) 992-8735
E-mail: btyson@nrcan.gc.ca

 

Scientific Services

 
Last Updated: 2005-10-20
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