Passage of Hydrogen through Steel

Abstract

INVESTIGATIONS have recently been carried out by Dr. J. M. Bryan and myself at the Low Temperature Research Station, Cambridge, on the relative rates of corrosion by dilute solutions of citric acid of different samples of mild steel sheets such as are used in the manufacture of tin-plate. In these tests an attempt was made to eliminate edge-corrosion by making the steel sheet the bottom of the corrosion chamber. This was done by cutting off the bottoms of glass bottles, grinding the edges and coating them with pure vaseline to prevent leakages, and applying the sheet. The whole was clamped up tightly in a suitable frame, the sheet itself being in contact on its outer side with a pad of filter paper resting on a wooden block. The chamber thus formed was connected to a gas burette so that the hydrogen formed through the action of the dilute acid could be measured, and the whole apparatus was held at 25° C.