The Effect of Brazing Parameters on Corrosion Behavior of Brazed Aluminum Joints

Fluid transmission pipes made of aluminum are widely used in petrochemical industries. For many applications, they have to be brazed to each other. The brazed joints, in many cases, are encountered with corrosive medias. This paper reports a part of a work to investigate the corrosion behavior of brazed AA6061 using AA4047 as filler metal with and without the use of flux under different brazing atmospheres. The samples brazed under air, vacuum, argon, and hydrogen atmospheres. The interfacial area of the joints was examined to ensure being free of any defects. The sides of each test piece were covered with an insulator and the surface of the joint was encountered to polarization test. The results revealed a significant difference of corrosion resistance. The samples that brazed under argon and hydrogen atmospheres had better corrosion resistance than other samples. The microstructure of the corroded joints revealed that the presence of defects, impurities due to use of flux and depth of filter metal penetration in base metal are crucial variables on the corrosion resistance of the joints.