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Internal Corrosion of Warm Formed Aluminum Alloy Automotive Heat Exchangers

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Abstract

The objective of this study is to evaluate the effects of sheet temper, forming conditions, and the resultant post-braze microstructure on the corrosion behavior of Al alloy heat exchangers. Accelerated corrosion tests were performed by flowing a corrosive water solution through brazed heat exchanger samples fabricated from O and H24 temper sheet formed between room temperature and 250 °C. Sheet perforations within the brazed samples were found to be concentrated at the coolant channel inlets, due to crevice corrosion, or around other formed features within the coolant channel, which was attributed to erosion corrosion. A clear relationship between corrosion initiation sites and local microstructure was not observed in the accelerated test. Potentiodynamic polarization measurements were performed using the corrosive water solution and sheet samples pre-strained to 4 and 10% and subjected to a simulated brazing heat treatment. The average corrosion current density was the same for the two conditions, but liquid film migration occurred during brazing in the sample strained to 4%, resulting in localized corrosion and greater variability in the polarization measurements. It is concluded that warm forming does not impair the corrosion resistance of H24 temper sheet, but the corrosion resistance of brazed samples fabricated from O temper sheet is altered by warm forming.

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Acknowledgments

The authors gratefully acknowledge the financial support for this work provided by Dana Canada Corporation, the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (Grant number APCPJ 447970-13), the Canada Research Chairs Secretariat, the Ontario Research Fund and the Ontario Advanced Manufacturing Consortium. The authors also acknowledge the assistance of the technical staff at Dana Canada Corporation for their assistance in fabricating, testing, and evaluating the brazed assemblies used in this study, and Dr. Haiou Jin of CanmetMATERIALS for his assistance in preparing the tensile specimens.

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  1. M. J. Benoit

    Present address: School of Engineering, University of British Columbia, Kelowna, Canada

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Mechanical and Mechatronics Engineering, University of Waterloo, 200 University Ave. W., Waterloo, ON, N2L 3G1, Canada

    M. J. Benoit, I. G. Ogunsanya, M. J. Worswick, M. A. Wells & C. M. Hansson

  2. Dana Canada Corporation, 656 Kerr St., Oakville, ON, L6K 3E4, Canada

    S. Winkler

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  1. M. J. Benoit
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  2. I. G. Ogunsanya
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  3. S. Winkler
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  4. M. J. Worswick
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Correspondence to M. J. Benoit.

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Benoit, M.J., Ogunsanya, I.G., Winkler, S. et al. Internal Corrosion of Warm Formed Aluminum Alloy Automotive Heat Exchangers. J. of Materi Eng and Perform 30, 2876–2889 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11665-021-05616-4

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