Determination of the Creep-Fatigue Interaction Diagram for Alloy 617

Alloy 617 is the leading candidate material for an intermediate heat exchanger for the very high temperature reactor (VHTR). As part of evaluating the behavior of this material in the expected service conditions, creep–fatigue testing was performed. The cycles to failure decreased compared to fatigue values when a hold time was added at peak tensile strain. At 850°C, increasing the tensile hold duration continued to degrade the creep–fatigue resistance, at least to the investigated strain–controlled hold time of up to 60 minutes at the 0.3% strain range and 240 minutes at the 1.0% strain range. At 950°C, the creep–fatigue cycles to failure are not further reduced with increasing hold duration, indicating saturation occurs at relatively short hold times. The creep and fatigue damage fractions have been calculated and plotted on a creep–fatigue interaction D–diagram. Test data from creep–fatigue tests at 800 and 1000°C on an additional heat of Alloy 617 are also plotted on the D–diagram.