Uniform and Pitting Corrosion Modeling for High-Strength Bridge Wires

Cable inspections revealed that severe corrosion of steel wires is one of the main failure mechanisms of cables. Accelerated corrosion experiments were conducted to evaluate the variation in the uniform and pitting corrosion depths of high-strength steel wires over time. The measured uniform corrosion depth followed a lognormal distribution with time-dependent corrosion variables at both the zinc coating corrosion stage and the steel corrosion stage. The block’s maximum pitting factors from a different exposure time were proven to be drawn from the same underlying continuous population and followed Gumbel distribution. The regression models of the scale and location parameter with increased surface area were obtained based on the experimental block’s maximum pitting factors. The extreme value distribution of the pit depth of corroding steel wires could be predicted by the developed statistical uniform and pitting factor models.