52

ASE 324L
Laboratory #9
High Temperature Creep and Creep Rupture
Purpose: Creep and stress rupture testing will be demonstrated and data will be provided for
analysis. This exercise will provide an introduction to the time and temperature dependent
deformation responses of engineering materials.
Background : So far, we have considered only the instantaneous elastic or plastic deformation
responses of solids as demonstrated in the tension tests of Labs #1 and #3. In these tension tests,
the applied displacement was steadily increased by the positive feedback control functions of the
MTS. However, many engineering applications of materials involve the application of a constant
load over a long period of time and under a variety of temperatures. In a number of cases, the
time and temperature dependent deformation responses in materials are important design
considerations and these phenomena, in part, determine the lifetime of the component of interest.
Creep: Creep is defined as the time dependent plastic deformation that occurs in a solid that is
subjected to a constant load or stress. In other words, if we load a tension specimen and hold that
load at a constant value, in time we will observe a time dependent plastic strain in addition to the
instantaneous elastic strain that occurred upon application of the load. This plastic creep
deformation increases in time and can ultimately result in failure.
A creep test per se, is simply to apply a constant load to a tension specimen at a constant
temperature and to observe the deformation in time over a sufficiently long time interval. The
stress rupture test is a useful extension of the creep test in which the specimen is allowed to creep
until it ruptures at a constant load and temperature.
Methods: We have three ATS Applied Testing Systems 2300 series 10,000 pound capacity
lever arm testers. These testers consist of a load frame, a load train, displacement and time
measuring devices and a means to maintain and control the temperature of the test specimen.
Figure 1 is a diagram of one of the testers. The specimen is loaded by applying weights to the
weight pan and the load is transmitted to the specimen and intensified by the 10:1 load ratio lever
arm load train. The specimen is enclosed in a clam shell temperature controlled furnace;
specimen displacement is measured using a mechanical extensometer and a DCDT transducer.
The mechanical extensometer preserves the specimen displacement, distance AB and carries it
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Assignment:
Read Chapter 13 in Materials Engineering, Science, Processing and Design. Do not prepare a
formal lab report this week, but answer the following questions:
1. In tension creep tests of a steel alloy, the following unit creep strains (Table 1) were
obtained.
Time Tensile Stresses in PSI
(hours) 3000 5000 8000 11000
0 0 0 0 0
50 0.020 0.045 0.099 0.135
200 0.028 0.053 0.140 0.238
400 0.030 0.055 0.149 0.305
600 0.031 0.058 0.155 0.368
800 0.033 0.062 0.164 0.433
1000 0.035 0.065 0.173 0.520
Table 1
(a) Plot the creep-time curves for each stress, using the data in Table 1. Use
Cartesian coordinates.
(b) Determine the minimum creep rates,
s
c using the average slope between 500 and
1000 hours.
(c) With the data obtained, determine the creep constants B and n in the equation
( )
0
/
n
s
B c o o = where o
0
= 1000 psi.
2. A tie bar in a chemical plant has been designed to withstand a stress of 25 MPa at 620C.
Creep tests carried out on specimens of the same material under these conditions indicated a
secondary creep rate of 3.110
-12
s
-1
. In actual service, for 30% of the time, the stress and
temperature increased to 30 MPa and 650C. Determine the average creep rate under the
service conditions. The power law exponent of the material is 5 and the activation energy is
160 kJ mol
-1
.
3. A pipe with a radius of 20 mm and wall thickness of 4 mm is made of a CrMo steel carries a
hot fluid (600C) under pressure (10MPa). The reference stress and strain rate in
53
/
0
0
n
Q RT
s
e
o
c c
o

| |
=
|
\ .
are 169 MPa and 3.4810
10
, the power law exponent is 7.5 and the
activation energy is 280 kJ mol
-1
.
a) Determine the creep rate of the pipe wall under these conditions.
b) Determine how long it would take the pipe wall to expand by 20 m.
4. Make a Larson-Miller Plot of the data in Table 2 with C = 20.
(a) Explain how you would determine C if you had rupture data at various
temperatures and stress levels available to you.
(b) Lab tests at 840 MPa and 650C resulted in a rupture time of 479 hrs. How long
would the material last at 840 MPa and 900C?
Temp. Stress Rupture Time
(C) (MPa) (hr)
650 1000 12
650 950 56
650 895 165
650 840 479
650 820 319
650 790 504
705 815 23
705 695 110
705 635 254
705 590 478
760 600 28
760 515 62
760 440 291
760 415 390
815 460 15
815 395 47
815 345 91
815 260 379
815 220 773
870 260 33
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870 215 73
870 180 196
870 145 300
900 170 69
900 140 163
900 105 738
Table 2
5. A casing for a jet engine requires a series of bolts to operate at temperatures that are more
than 50% of the melting temperature of the bolt material. There is a concern that the loads in
the bolts will relax over time. The bolts will be operating in a stress/temperature regime
where dislocation creep dominates. In that case, the secondary creep rate for a fixed
temperature is
( )
n
s
B c o = , where stress is in psi and time is in hours. Determine how long it
will take the bolts to relax to 60% of the initial stress if the tensile modulus of the material is
30x10
6
psi, the initial stress is 4000 psi,
n = 5 and B = 10
26
.
6. Describe the various deformation
mechanisms that are shown in the
deformation mechanism map. In the creep
related mechanisms, indicate how the
secondary creep rate depends on stress,
temperature, intrinsic lattice and
metallurgical parameters.
7. Do Problem E13.9 in the book.
8. Do Problem E 13.15 in the book