Environmental effect of PWR primary water on fatigue life of stainless steel (influence of loading rate on fatigue life reduction)

Fatigue tests on Type 316 stainless steel specimens were conducted for various combinations of rise time and strain range in simulated pressurized water reactor (PWR) water. It was demonstrated that crack growth rate estimated from test results correlated well with the strain intensity factor range. An equation for predicting F-en was obtained as a function of rise time and strain range. It was found that, although F-en depends on strain range, the magnitude of the change in F-en due to the strain range is negligibly small compared with the scatter in the test results.