Duplex stainless steels are high strength and corrosion resistant alloys, whose properties are devoted to the fine microstructure composed by similar amounts of ferrite and austenite and also to the high concentrations of Cr, Mo and N in solid solution. Not for coincidence, duplex steels are extensively used in chemical and petrochemical industries. However, welding operations conditions can promote the unbalance of the ferrite/austenite proportions mainly in the welding metal, with decrease of the properties mentioned. For this reason, non destructive measurements of ferrite content, by ferritoscope, is used after welding pipes. Ferritoscope is a commercial instrument which uses the initial magnetic permeability to analyze the ferrite content in duplex and austenitic stainless steels. The inspection with ferritoscope is a procedure commonly used in building and assembly of spools of duplex and superduplex stainless steels. The objective of this work was to evaluate the amounts of phases in the welding metal for different spools welded in the field by use of ferritoscope and metallographic replica techniques. The results showed that the two techniques measured similar values of ferrite and austenite, but ferritoscope analysis can be influenced by shape and surface conditions of the welded joint.
Duplex Stainless Steel; Welding; Non destructive Testing; Magnetic properties; Metallographic replica
