Tribocorrosion in marine environments

Abstract: This chapter will present practical tribocorrosion failure cases from the oil and gas industry with focus on piston rods. In addition, testing and material qualification test methods will be presented. In marine operations heavy machinery is typically involved in critical operations such as mooring, operation of bow ports, material handling by cranes and hoisting systems, riser tensioning, heave compensation and rotation equipment during drilling. Usually the key components of these systems have slide bearing or sealing surfaces exposed to wear in an offshore corrosive environment, such as cylinder piston rods. These components often suffer from enhanced material loss in such a combined wear and corrosive environment, generating large annual maintenance costs, posing high potential safety risk and indirectly causing environmental pollution if failures occur.