Published Online:August 2024
Product Name:The IUP Journal of Mechanical Engineering
Product Type:Article
Product Code:IJME020824
Author Name:Ebitei Charles and Makanjuola Oki
Availability:YES
Subject/Domain:Engineering
Download Format:PDF
Pages:17
Corrosion is a destructive attack on a material in the environment that occurs in the aviation industry, as in various other industries. Corrosion may be aqueous or dry. For aqueous corrosion, an electrolyte, a thin film of moisture, contaminated or otherwise, must wet the surface of the substrate. Then anodic and cathodic reactions occur. These may be separated by a few atomic units or larger distances depending upon the form of corrosion or the composition of the substrate and environment. In dry corrosion, corrosion manifests as either general or localized. Its high temperature counterpart involves reactions at high temperature regimes with fluids, which may be ordinary air contaminated with pollutants such as CO2 , SO2 , etc. In all cases, the substrates disintegrate, flow and collapse. Both processes involve the movement of electrons and ions. This paper focuses on corrosion and its mitigation as witnessed in the aviation industry, which includes aircraft, airport buildings, runways/storage facilities, pipes and others employed for the comfort of the flying public. For corrosion in aircraft (aqueous and high temperature), diagnostic tools could be deployed in the form of on-board sensors, for diagnosing where and when corrosion-related maintenance is required. Accurate examination of various corrosion incidents and procedures is critical for aviation safety, particularly for the aircraft, which will go a long way in minimizing aircraft maintenance cost which is huge in the Nigerian context.
Scully (1966) and Cwalina (2014) defined corrosion as degradation of materials of construction by both chemical and electrochemical interaction with their environments. Steel rusts, plastics crack and craze, concretes crack and spall, and wood rots when exposed to inclement weather. All these materials find applications in one manner or the other in the aviation industry.