Understanding the role of hydrogen on creep behaviour of Zircaloy-4 cladding tubes using nanoindentation

The present article investigates the influence of hydrogen concentration on the creep performance of cold-worked stress-relieved unirradiated Zircaloy-4 cladding tube using nanoindentation technique. The as-received Zircaloy-4 tube is hydrided to the concentrations of 600 ppm and 900 ppm using gaseous hydrogen charging method. Constant load indentation creep tests are performed for a dwell period of 600 s in the temperature range of 300°C-500 °C at 1000 μN, 2000 μN, and 3000 μN. The impact of hydrogen is evaluated in terms of steady state power law creep exponent and activation energy. The power law creep exponent decreases with increase in hydrogen concentration, however, it remains fairly constant with increase in temperature up to 500 °C. Moreover, activation energy too decreases significantly with increase in hydrogen concentration. The mean stress exponent and activation energy are found to be 3.58 and 28.67 kJ/mol, respectively, for as-received sample