Creep strength enhanced ferritic steels like T/P 91 and T/P 92 are widely used for the fabrication of pressure vessel components in the petro-chemical and thermal power industry. Today, a new generation of 9-12% Cr CSEF steels like MARBN, Save12AD, G115 and Super VM12 are entering into the market. All CSEF steels require an accurate post-weld heat treatment after welding. This paper discusses the impact of chemical composition on Ac1 as well as the transformation behavior during post-weld heat treatment in a temperature range below and above Ac1. The Ac1 temperature of weld metals with variations in chemical composition has been determined and thermodynamic calculations has been carried out. Simulations of heat treatment cycles with variations in temperature have been carried out in a quenching dilatometer. The dilatation curves have been analyzed in order to detect any phase transformation during heating or holding at post weld heat treatment. Creep rupture tests have been carried out on P91 and Super VM12 type weld metals in order to investigate the effect of sub- and intercritical post weld heat treatment on creep rupture strength.

Grade 92 steel has been widely applied in the power generation industry for use as steam pipes, headers, tubes, etc. owing to a good combination of creep and corrosion resistance. For the welding of thick section pipes, a multi-pass submerged arc welding process is typically used to achieve sufficient toughness in the weld. To relieve the internal stress in the welds and to stabilise their microstructures, a post weld heat treatment (PWHT) is commonly applied. The heat treatment conditions used for the PWHT have a significant effect on both the resulting microstructure and the creep behaviour of the welds. In this study, interrupted creep tests were carried out on two identical Grade 92 welds that had been given PWHTs at two different temperatures: 732°C and 760°C. It was found that the weld with the lower PWHT temperature had a significantly reduced stain rate during the creep test. In addition, microstructural examination of the welds revealed that the primary location of creep damage was in the heat affected zone in the sample with the lower PWHT temperature, whereas it was in the weld metal in the sample with the higher PWHT temperature. To understand the effect of the different PWHT temperatures on the microstructure, initially the microstructures in the head portions of the two creep test bars were compared. This comparison was performed quantitatively using a range of electron/ion microscopy based techniques. It was apparent that in the sample subjected to the higher PWHT temperature, larger Laves phase particles occurred and increased matrix recovery was observed compared with the sample subjected to the lower PWHT temperature.

The efficiency of power plants is depending on the steam temperature and/or the steam pressure. Efficiency increasing from 35% to 42-45% require increasing of the steam temperature over 600°C and the pressure over 26 MPa. According to the designer opinion it is not profitable to use classical low alloy creep resistant steels 16Mo3, 13CrMo4-5 or 10CrMo9-10 for membrane waterwall construction for these service condition. New modified low alloy creep resistance T23 and T24 (7CrMoVTiB10-10) steels were developed for membrane waterwalls. Welding of these steels with small thickness (around 6.3 mm) should be enabled without preheating and post weld heat treatment (PWHT) due to the lower carbon content below 0.1%. High creep rupture strength (CRS) values are achieved by Ti, N and B elements alloyed to T24 steel. The original expectation that the welding small thickness without preheating was early overcome and was wrong. According to the present experience the T24 steel is welded with preheating at 150-250°C depending on the wall thickness and welded joint toughness in order to achieve required hardness and impact toughness values. Opinions on the T24 welded joints post weld heat treatment (PWHT) requirements are still inconsistent. Especially the membrane waterwalls of the supercritical power plants are still produced without PWHT.

There is a constant need for improved knowledge of the influence of non-standard processing on the expected performance of creep strength enhanced ferritic (CSEF) materials as the total installed tonnage of these materials is rapidly increasing across the power generation industry. Cr-Mo-V steel grades micro-alloyed with niobium and titanium designed for pressurized equipment operating in the supercritical steam range proved to be very sensitive to relative minor variations in the principal heat treatment parameters time and temperature, when compared to the traditional Cr-Mo-V grades. A key component for successful welds is optimised post weld heat treatment (PWHT). Under certain conditions premature failures of welds can occur when incorrect weld and heat treatment performance result in a reduction of specified mechanical properties and high temperature creep performance, it is therefore of significant importance to have a good understanding of actual material properties for effective operation and plant life studies. This study investigated the effect and impact variations of post weld heat treatment time and temperature on mechanical properties of tungsten inert gas (TIG) and manual metal arc (MMA) welds on Grade 91 pipes from a set of reference samples. This is in preparation of establishing a benchmark set of tests to determine the integrity and expected long-term performance of butt-welds from limited site sample volumes, providing a non-intrusive methodology to identify welds suspected to have received non-standard PWHT cycles on Grade 91 pipework systems.

Qualifying welding procedures for repair of components in high temperature service requires careful consideration of factors including identification of the materials involved, existing mechanical properties and service operating parameters such as temperature, pressure and environment. Selection of weld metals to match, under match or overmatch base material as well as direct and indirect consequences on the heat-affected zone also require evaluation. Application of post weld heat treatment and ramifications where dissimilar base materials are involved are discussed plus the necessity of conducting tests at the operating temperatures and conditions where information is not available from the literature. Each of these factors is discussed and examples provided.

Welded joints of Ni-base alloys are often the critical part of components operated under high temperature service conditions. Especially welds in thick-walled structures are susceptible to various crack phenomena. Creep rupture and deformation behavior of different similar welds of Alloy 617B, both circumferential and longitudinal, were determined in many research German projects with the aim to qualify the nickel alloys and its welded joints for the use in highly efficient Advanced Ultra Supercritical (AUSC) power plants. Damage mechanisms and failure behavior have also been investigated within these projects. In order to reduce the welding residual stresses in thick-walled components a post weld heat treatment (PWHT) for Alloy 617B is recommended after welding. This PHWT reduces not only residual stresses but causes changes in the damage mechanisms and failure behavior of welded joints of Alloy 617B. Improving effects of PWHT have been investigated in this study and results of microstructural investigations were correlated with the material behavior.

This paper summarizes recent efforts to improve creep performance in Grade 91 (Mod. 9Cr-1Mo, ASTM A387) steel weldments via non-standard heat treatments prior to welding. Such heat treatments offer a potential solution for minimizing Type IV failures in creep strength enhanced ferritic (CSEF) steels. A lower temperature tempering (LTT, 650°C) of the 9Cr steels prior to gas tungsten arc welding (GTAW) resulted in improved creep-rupture life at 650°C compared to the samples tempered at a standard condition (HTT, 760°C) before welding. From detailed characterization of precipitation kinetics in the heat affected zone, it was hypothesized that M 23 C 6 carbides in the fine-grain heat-affected zone (FGHAZ) in the LTT sample were fully dissolved, resulting in re-precipitation of strengthening carbides during post weld heat treatment (PWHT). This was not the case in the HTT sample since M 23 C 6 in the FGHAZ was only partially dissolved prior to welding, which caused coarsening of existing M 23 C 6 after PWHT and premature creep failure in the FGHAZ. However, it was also found that the LTT raised the ductile-brittle transition temperature above room temperature (RT). Two different thermo-mechanical treatments (TMTs); two-step tempering and aus-forging/aus-aging, of the modified 9Cr-1Mo steels were attempted, in order to control the balance between creep properties and RT ductility, through control of precipitation kinetics of the M 23 C 6 carbides and/or MX carbo-nitrides. The hardness map of the TMT samples after GTAW and PWHT were evaluated.

Nimonic 263 alloy was selected for gas turbine combustor transition piece due to its excellent high temperature mechanical performance. In present work, Nimonic 263 alloy plate with thickness of 5mm was welded using 263 filler metal by GTAW, then post weld heat treatment of 800℃/8h/air cool was carried out. The hardness and impact toughness of welded joints were measured, and the microstructure evolution after aging at 750℃ for 3000h was investigated by scanning electron microscopy(SEM). The results show that, during the aging process, the hardness of weld metal increases firstly and then decreases. The impact toughness decreases significantly at first and then increase. Furthermore, some fluctuations can be detected in hardness and impact toughness after long-term thermal exposure. The significant decrease in the impact toughness of the aged welded joints mainly results from the precipitation of η phase around grain boundary and intergranular MC phase. The hardness of weld metal increases due to the precipitation of more carbides and γ′ phase after 1000h aging, then decreases owing to the growth of γ′ phase after 3000h aging.

Delivered condition of Inconel740H specified in ASME Code Case 2702 is solution heat treated and aged condition, fabricating performances are also based on the condition, and a re-annealing and aging shall be performed if cold forming to strains is over 5%. These almost harsh requirements bring great inconvenience for its engineering practice and utilization. The comparative bending tests on 740H tubes in solution heat treated + aged condition and solution heat treated condition were performed, and the rules’ reasonability of the specification on delivered condition was discussed and analyzed from point view of deformability and weldability in the paper. The bending test results showed that tube bent was difficult because of its high strength and limited deforming capacity in solution heat treated + aged condition. Therefore, the material supplied in the solution condition may be better from fabricating points. Whether re-solution for the bent tube is performed after bending depends on its bending radius, followed by welding and post weld heat treatment of component (this treatment can also be the aging treatment for annealed sector at the same time), this treating manner can meet regulatory requirements. For solution tubes, however, there are some inconveniences to its engineering application because fewer research studies were carried out on its properties up to now, and no regulations on them were given for the material in the specification. Suggestions are: 1) deeply investigating the properties of tubes in solution condition, including mechanical and fabricating performances, 2) adding the mechanical properties, maximum allowable cold forming to stain without performing re-solution and weld strength reduction factor of solution material to the code case.

In Europe between 2006 and 2012 several ultra-super-critical (USC) coal-fired power plants were built employing T24 (7CrMoVTiB10-10 / DIN EN 10216-2:2014-03 / VdTÜV sheet 533/2) in membrane walls. During commissioning stress corrosion cracking (SCC) on the tube-to-tube butt welds appeared. The widespread damages required the development of a new patented commissioning procedure to avoid recurring damages. Although this commissioning procedure was employed successfully and the power plants are in operation since then, a debate about the implementation of a hardness limit for such butt welds was initiated. According to the European standards butt welds of T24 boiler tubes with wall thickness < 10 mm (0.3937 in) do not require any post-weld heat treatment (PWHT) and no hardness limits are given. When looking at manufacturing related issues such as an imminent risk of cold cracking after welding of micro-alloyed steels a widely applied but coarse hardness limit is 350 HV. Based on laboratory tests, some authors reallocated this 350 HV hardness limit for addressing SCC susceptibility of low-alloyed steels. This article describes typical hardness levels of T24 boiler tube TIG butt welds and the SCC behavior in high temperature water. Further the effect of the stress relief heat treatment (SRHT) of the boiler membrane walls between 450 °C and 550 °C (842 °F and 1022 °F) on its hardness values and on the SCC behavior is discussed, showing that the hardness values should not be used as an indicator for SCC susceptibility of T24 boiler tube butt welds.

The global electric power production is largely dependent on the operation of fossil-fired generation units. Many coal-fired units are exceeding 300,000 hours, which is beyond the expected design life. This has caused a continuous need to inspect steam touched components operating at high temperature and pressure. State-of-the-art coal and combined cycle gas units are specifying ever-greater amounts of the Creep Strength Enhanced Ferritic (CSEF) steels such as Grade 91 or Grade 92. The martensitic 9%Cr CSEF steels were developed to provide greater strength than traditional low alloy power plant steels, such as Grades 11, 12 and 22. The enhanced strength allows for a reduction in overall wall thickness in new or replacement components. Extensive research in both service failures and laboratory testing has shown that time-dependent creep damage can develop differently in Grade 91 steel when compared to low alloy steels. Furthermore, the creep strength in Grade 91 can vary by more than a factor of 10 between different heats. This wide variation of creep strength has led to extensive research in understanding the damage mechanisms and progression of damage in this steel. In this study, large cross weld samples were fabricated from thick wall piping in Grade 91 steel using two different heats of material. One weld was fabricated in a ‘damage tolerant’ heat and another weld was fabricated in a ‘damage intolerant’ heat of material. The samples were subjected to a post-weld heat treatment (PWHT) at a temperature of 745°C (1375°F) for 1.50 hours. Hardness maps were collected on the cross-welds in the as-welded and PWHT condition for both weldments. Cross-weld creep test conditions were selected to develop accelerated damage representative of in-service behavior. The test samples were interrupted at multiple stages and nondestructively evaluated (NDE) with advanced phased-array ultrasonic techniques. Samples were developed to variable levels of damage (50% to 100% life fraction) in both weldments. Metallographic sections were extracted at specific locations to validate the NDE findings using light emitting diode, laser and scanning electron microscopy. This research is being used to help validate the level of damage that can be reliably detected using conventional and advanced NDE techniques.

As flux cored wires for gas metal arc welding offer several technical and economic advantages they are becoming more and more popular. Matching flux cored wires for welding P92 have already been available for several years. A matching flux cored wire for welding the Co-alloyed cast steel CB2, which is used for turbine and valve casings operating at steam temperatures of up to 620°C, was developed recently. To connect casings with P92 pipes, dissimilar welding of CB2 to P92 is necessary. This can be done with filler metal that matches either CB2 or P92. Pre-tests have confirmed that flux cored arc welding (FCAW) can generally be used for dissimilar joint welding of CB2 to P92. To evaluate creep rupture strength dissimilar welds were performed with filler metal matching CB2 and P92, respectively. TIG welding was used for the root and the second pass and FCAW for the intermediate and final passes. Cross-weld tensile tests, side bend tests and impact tests of weld metals and heat-affected zones were carried out at ambient temperatures after two post-weld heat treatments (PWHT), each at 730°C for 12 hours. Creep rupture tests of cross-weld samples were performed at 625°C. This study compares the results of the mechanical tests at ambient temperature and the creep rupture tests, and discusses why P92 filler metals are preferred for such welds.

CrMoV cast steels are widely utilized for steam turbine and valve casings, and are subjected to operating and loading conditions which can promote damage mechanisms such as thermal fatigue, creep, erosion, etc. These components are subjected to variable, and sometimes severe conditions because of flexible operation. Therefore, there is a growing need for weld repair techniques including those which do not mandate post weld heat treatment (PWHT), e.g. so-called ‘temper bead’ weld repair. In this study, a simulated weld repair was performed using a temper bead technique. The maximum hardness in the heat affected zone (HAZ) CrMoV steel was ≤400HV. The integrity of the repair methodology was investigated using destructive testing, including hardness mapping, Charpy impact tests, tensile tests, low cycle fatigue and cross-weld creep, and the microstructure was assessed using light optical microscopy and scanning electron microscopy (SEM).

The application of cold weld repair techniques in the power industry has been well documented. This type of repair is only considered when a conventional repair (involving post-weld heat treatment) is impracticable or the penalties of time and cost for conventional repair are sufficiently high. A typical cold weld repair in the UK has involved low alloy ferritic steel (½Cr½Mo¼V, 2¼Cr1Mo) components welded with nickel based SMAW consumables or ferritic FCAW consumables. Modified 9Cr steel components have been used in UK power plant since the late 1980’s for a number of applications, such as superheater outlet headers, reheat drums and main steam pipework. The problems associated with this material have also been well documented, particularly premature type IV cracking of welds on creep weakened modified 9Cr steel. RWE Generation UK have developed modified 9Cr cold weld repairs on headers, pipework and tubes. These repairs have been underwritten with extensive testing. This paper will describe the work performed on developing T91 cold weld repairs and where they have been applied on power plant.

High temperature regions in the upper sections of the advanced ultrasupercritical (AUSC) boilers are exposed to temperatures higher than traditional supercritical (SC) boilers and require high strength materials. Use of modified 9-12% Cr materials such as T91 and T92, while meeting the strength requirements, are still under research stage for large-scale fabrication of the membrane walls for several reasons, such as required post weld heat treatment PWHT (ASME Code) or hardness limits on as-welded structures (European codes). The main objective of this paper is to explore alternate tubing materials that do not require a PWHT in the high temperature sections of the AUSC boiler membrane walls. Composite bimetallic tubing with high strength cladding, applied by weld overlay or co-extrusion that may meet the requirement of high operating temperature and high overall strength, is addressed through an alternate design criterion. Bimetallic tubes can replace the single metal tubes made from 9-12% Cr materials. The bimetallic tube is assumed to be fabricated from Grade 23 steel (base tubes) with Alloy 617 overlaid. The alternate design method is based on an iterative analytical solution for the through-wall heat transfer and stresses in a composite tube with temperatures and strength variations of both the materials considered in detail. A number of different analyses were performed using the proposed analytical approach, methodology verified through benchmark solutions and then applied to the membrane wall configurations.

In this paper, the performance of T23 and 12Cr1MoVG water wall tubes as well as their welded joints in engineering applications is reported. It was found that the T23 water wall tube may have water leak problems during its operation. In order to make sure the safe operation, leakage reasons of T23 water wall tube were analyzed and improvement measures were taken. Recommendations on the choice of water wall material of 1000MW USC tower boiler are given.

ENCIO (European Network for Component Integration and Optimization) is a European project aiming at qualifying materials, components, manufacturing processes, as well as erection and repair concepts, as follow-up of COMTES700 activities and by means of erecting and operating a new Test Facility. The 700°C technology is a key factor for the increasing efficiency of coal fired power plants, improving environmental and economic sustainability of coal fired power plants and achieving successful deployment of carbon capture and storage technologies. The ENCIO-project is financed by industrial and public funds. The project receives funding from the European Community's Research Fund for Coal and Steel (RFCS) under grant agreement n° RFCPCT-2011-00003. The ENCIO started on 1 July 2011. The overall project duration is six years (72 months), to allow enough operating hours, as well as related data collection, investigations and evaluation of results. The ENCIO Test Facility will be installed in the “Andrea Palladio” Power Station which is owned and operated by ENEL, located in Fusina, very close to Venice (Italy). The Unit 4 was selected for the installation of the Test Facility and the loops are planned for 20.000 hours of operation at 700°C. The present paper summarizes the current status of the overall process design of the thick-walled components, the test loops and the scheduled operating conditions, the characterizations program for the base materials and the welded joints, like creep and microstructural analysis also after service exposure.

During commissioning of recently built modern, and highly efficient coal-fired power plants, cracks were detected after very short time of operation within the welds of membrane walls made from alloy T24. The root cause analysis revealed transgranular and mostly intergranular cracks adjacent to the heat affected zone beside weld joints. At that time, the degradation mechanism was rather unclear, which led to an extended root cause analysis for clarification of these failures. The environmentally assisted cracking behavior of alloy T24 in oxygenated high-temperature water was determined by an experimental test program. Hereby, the cracking of 2½% chromium steel T24 and 1% chromium steel T12 were determined in high-temperature water depending on the effect of water chemistry parameters such as dissolved oxygen content, pH, and temperature, but also with respect to the mechanical load component by residual stresses and the microstructure. The results clearly show that the cracking of this low-alloy steel in oxygenated high-temperature water is driven by the dissolved oxygen content and the breakdown of the passive corrosion protective oxide scale on the specimens by mechanical degradation of the oxide scale as fracture due to straining. The results give further evidence that a reduction of the residual stresses by a stress relief heat treatment of the boiler in combination with the strict compliance of the limits for dissolved oxygen content in the feed water according to water chemistry standards are effective countermeasures to prevent environmentally assisted cracking of T24 membrane wall butt welds during plastic strain transients.

The susceptibilities of hot cracking and reheat cracking of A-USC candidate Ni-based alloys were evaluated relatively by Trans-Varestraint testing and Slow Strain Rate Tensile (SSRT) testing. In addition, semi-quantitative evaluation of the stress relaxation cracking susceptibility of Alloy 617 was conducted, because stress relaxation cracking in the heat affected zone (HAZ) has actually been reported for repair welds in Alloy 617 steam piping in European A-USC field-testing. Solidification cracking susceptibilities of Alloy 617 were the highest; followed by HR35, Alloy 740 and Alloy 141, which were all high; and then by HR6W and Alloy 263, which were relatively low. In addition, liquation cracking was observed in the HAZ of Alloy 617. The reheat cracking susceptibilities of Alloy 617, Alloy 263, Alloy 740 and Alloy 141 were somewhat higher than those of HR6W and HR35 which have good creep ductility due to the absence of γ’ phase precipitates. A method to evaluate stress relaxation cracking susceptibility was developed by applying a three-point bending test using a specimen with a V-notch and finite element analysis (FEA), and it was shown that stress relaxation cracking of aged Alloy 617 can be experimentally replicated. It was proposed that a larger magnitude of creep strain occurs via stress relaxation during the three-point bending test due to a higher yield strength caused by γ’ phase strengthening, and that low ductility due to grain boundary carbides promoted stress relaxation cracking. The critical creep strain curve of cracking can be created by means of the relationship between the initial strain and the creep strain during the three-point bending tests, which were calculated by FEA. Therefore, the critical conditions to cause cracking could be estimated from the stress relaxation cracking boundary from of the relationship between the initial strain and the creep strain during the three-point bending test.

In order to reduce CO 2 emissions and improve power generation efficiency, a development project involving an advanced USC (A-USC) plant has been carried out in Japan since 2008. Nibased alloys are candidate materials for boiler components with high temperature steam conditions, which are much stronger than conventional heat resistant steel. However, Ni-based alloys have never been applied with respect to the high pressure parts and thick walled components of USC coal-fired power plants. In this study, therefore, fabrication and characteristic properties, such as weldability, the weld joint and bent part properties, and weld cracking susceptibilities of Ni-based alloys such as HR6W, HR35 and two types of Alloy617 (High B and Low B) pipes were evaluated. Additionally, two types of HR6W header mock-ups and a HR6W tube element mock-up were fabricated. With the exception of Alloy617 (High B), the fabrication trials of Ni-based alloy pipes were conducted successfully, and the long-term creep strength of weldments and bends of Ni-based alloy pipes were found to be nearly equivalent to those of base metal. In the case of Alloy617 (High B), hot cracking was observed.