Corrosion fatigue (CF) experiments, including both high-cycle axial fatigue (S-N curve) and fatigue crack growth (FCG), have been performed on 7050 aluminum alloys in a 3.5 wt% NaCl solution as a function of aging treatment. The results of these environmental tests were compared with those obtained in laboratory air to characterize the effect of aging treatment on CF susceptibility. Fatigue resistance in both peak aged (T6) and overaged (T73) tempers was dramatically reduced by the aqueous chloride environment. The FCG rates for T73 condition were lower than the counterparts for T6 condition in both air and saline solution. 7050-T73 alloy exhibited longer fatigue lives in air but shorter ones in the corrosive environment as compared to the T6 temper. This may be attributed to the formation of more extensive and larger corrosion pits acting as crack nuclei to facilitate crack initiation, in the T73 tempered condition. Comparison of CF and stress corrosion cracking (SCC) results reveals that overaging treatments used to improve grain boundary characteristics and increase the intergranular SCC resistance might not guarantee an equivalent improvement in the resistance to transgranular CF cracking. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
