Multiple Cracks Interactions in Stress Corrosion Cracking: In Situ Observation by Digital Image Correlation and Phase Field Modeling

Interactions between multiple stress corrosion cracks (M-SCC) have a major influence on crack growth but are underestimated in models devoted to the evaluation of the lifetime of industrial components. In this study, the growth and interactions between multiple cracks on a sensitized Alloy 600 in a 0.01 M tetrathionate solution, were studied by digital image correlation Digital image correlation (DIC). Cracks exceeding 55 µm in length and 0.45 µm in opening were successfully detected by DIC. The emergence and intensification of interactions modify the growth of the crack colony which evolves from a mostly surface crack propagation (lack of interactions) to in-depth propagation controlled by crack shielding. A multiphysics phase field model was jointly developed and successfully implemented to simulate intergranular M-SCC. It coupled a robust algorithm based on brittle fracture and a diffusion model. The resulting modeling allowed simulating the interactions between cracks and the shielding effects observed experimentally. Finally, 3-D quantification of crack propagation was performed by micro-tomography and digital volume correlation (DVC).