Corrosion on polymers, both plastics and rubber materials, is in many cases similar to metals but in other cases it looks very different. Corrosion attacks on polymers are often hard to discover, the material may look normal but can in fact be embrittled and have lost it´s mechanical strength.
Mechanical stressed polymers applied in chemical environments may initiate cracks on the surfaces. These cracks can thereafter propagate through the material either as a result of the mechanical stresses or in combination with continuing chemical attack. Corrosion of polymers can be divided into either chemical reaction or physical interaction