Linear polarization instruments

Linear polarization instruments provide an instantaneous corrosion-rate data, by utilizing polarization phenomena. These instruments are commercially available as two-electrode Corrater and three electrode Pairmeter (Figure 4-472). The instruments are portable, with probes that can be utilized at several locations in the drilling fluid circulatory systems. In both Corrater and Pairmeter, the technique involves monitoring electrical potential of one of the electrodes with respect to one of the other electrodes as a small electrical current is applied. The amount of applied current necessary to change potential (no more than 10 to 20 mV) is proportional to corrosion intensity. The electronic meter converts the amount of current to read out a number that represents the corrosion rate in mpy. Before recording the data, sufficient time should be allowed for the electrodes to reach equilibrium with the environment. The corrosion-rate reading obtained by these instruments is due to corrosion of the probe element at that instant [184]. 

Other limitations of this instrument are the same as those of linear polarization instruments discussed earlier. 

The diffusion models work reasonably well for predicting the initiation time. The chloride profile and the carbonation depth can be measured in the field or from cores in the laboratory. However, it is far more difficult to look at the next step in our model. Corrosion rate measurements are now being taken in the field with linear polarization instruments and empirical estimates have been made with different instruments for the time to spalling. 

Polarized light is obtained when a beam of natural (unpolarized) light passes through some types of anisotropic matter. In optical instruments this is usually a birefringent crystal which splits the incident unpolarized beam into two beams of perpendicular linear polarization, known as the ordinary and extraordinary beams. Anisotropy can also be created by the effect of an electric field, this being known as the Kerr effect. 

The fundamental requirement for the existence of molecular dissymmetry is that the molecule cannot possess any improper axes of rofation, the minimal interpretation of which implies additional interaction with light whose electric vectors are circularly polarized. This property manifests itself in an apparent rotation of the plane of linearly polarized light (polarimetry and optical rotatory dispersion) [1-5], or in a preferential absorption of either left- or right-circularly polarized light (circular dichroism) that can be observed in spectroscopy associated with either transitions among electronic [3-7] or vibrational states [6-8]. Optical activity has also been studied in the excited state of chiral compounds [9,10]. An overview of the instrumentation associated with these various chiroptical techniques is available [11]. 

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