Synergistic investigation into the marine parameters’ effect on the corrosion rate of AISI 316 stainless steel

In this paper, the corrosion rate of the austenitic stainless steel AISI 316, under the synergistic effect of environmental factors, has been assessed via potentiodynamic polarization scan. Salinity, velocity, pH and temperature are the factors that induce effects on the corrosion rate of the considered metal. Quantitative analysis is applied using the full two-level factorial experimental design method. This analysis calculates the contribution value of each parameter in changing the quantity of average corrosion rate in both individual and synergistic cases. In addition, qualitative analysis has been used to predict the variation direction. These two analyses show the important role of the synergistic action that changes the variation direction of corrosion rate and the contribution percentage of each parameter in varying the value of corrosion rate. Applying both quantitative and qualitative analyses can show the magnitude and quality of each parameter’s effect, which is remarkably valuable in marine application designs.