The corrosion behavior of 26000 brass has been studied in 3% NaCl and in ar
tificial seawater using electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) and el
ectrochemical noise analysis (ENA). Benzotriazole (BTA). gluconic acid sodi
um salt (GASS) and polyphosphoric acid sodium salt (PP) were evaluated as c
orrosion inhibitors. While BTA provides excellent corrosion inhibition in b
oth media, PP was not very effective. For GASS maximum corrosion inhibition
was obtained at a concentration of 0.01 M. Analysis of the electrochemical
noise (ECN) data demonstrated the need for removal of drifts in the potent
ial and current fluctuations during the measurement period that affected th
e values of the power spectral density (PSD) plots, After trend removal the
slopes of the current PSD plots were -2 in the absence of BTA and -1 in it
s presence. The slopes of the potential PSD plots did not change from their
value of -2 due to the addition of BTA. Very good agreement of impedance a
nd spectral noise plots was observed after trend removal for solutions cont
aining BTA. The location index was not found to provide information concern
ing corrosion mechanisms. Skewness and kurtosis for both potential and curr
ent fluctuations had similar values in the absence and presence of BTA that
were typical of a normal distribution of the ECN data. (C) 2001 Elsevier S
cience Ltd. All rights reserved.