Corrosion at a concrete plant

[waterguyMN]

I have a corrosion issue that you may be able to help me solve. I work for a water treatment company and I work with a concrete plant that uses a humidification chamber (75'x75'x25') to cure concrete blocks. While curing, these blocks are stored on "pallets" that are 3'x3'x1" steel plates. These plates are corroding at an alarming rate (days). The cost to replace these plates is considerable so we have been looking for a way to retard the corrosion to get prolonged life from the pallets. We have concluded that the cause of the corrosion is the availability of oxygen and the humidity in the chamber. We looked into the VCI technology but the size onf the chamber makes this solution unfeasible.

Any suggestions?

Thank you

 

[kenvlach]

Might a VCI get into the concrete pores & react with the wet alkalinity or somehow inhibit curing?
Find an applicable spec. for the manufacture of concrete block, maybe ASTM C90-06 Standard Specification for Loadbearing Concrete Masonry Units, or one from concrete aassociations like

http://www.aci-int.org

or

http://www.ncma.org

and don't do anything contrary, like introducing any foreign substance.

Plastic coating the steel, either powder coating or using adhesive-backed film, would stop the corrosion, but might abrade from the concrete blocks. Worth testing.

Electroless nickel plating should work but expensive.

Unless using steam curing, maybe best is to switch to polyethylene forklift pallets. Usual size is 40x48x6" but others available. See page 1501 at

http://www.mcmaster.com/

 

[EdStainless]

Plastic pallets may not be stong enough. Maybe plastic palets with a lighter steel plate on the top?
I like the idea of powder or spray plastic coating steel pallets. You might look into a local company that does spray pickup truck bed liners.
Or you could use heavy gage poly sheeting on top of your steel plates. Don't glue it down, just loose. Then you clean everything after each use.

You also don't really want to use solid plates. They will go in cold, get wet with condensation, and then not really drain. The other issue is that when these are loaded/unloaded you are scraping off the corrosion and exposing fresh metal that will corrode faster.

= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
Corrosion, every where, all the time.
Manage it or it will manage you.

http://www.trent-tube.com/contact/Tech_Assist.cfm

 

[corrosionman]

Are your mild steel pallets in contact with any stainless supports ???

 

[waterguyMN]

Thank you for the valuable responses...

We can't use non steel pallets due to the weight of the blocks; the plates will bow and the set is not desireable.

The plates are stacked on steel racks which are coated in a bearing grease.

We're looking into having the plates treated with a coating, like a nickel or some other metal treatment. This will likely be expensive but it may be worth it to keep from having to replace the plates biannually...
Thanks again.

Any suggestions as to other options would be appreciated!

Brad

 

[rustbuster]

You might try teflon sheets layed atop the steel, in this environment crevices will be an issue. The teflon should minimze corrosion to the outer edges. We use it for pipe supports / slides on systems subject to expasion with good success.