Technique cuts time and cost of bending jacketed piping

Technique uses a stiff medium in the annular space between inner and outer pipes of jacketed piping in transfer lines. The process eliminates splitting and welding and makes possible the use of standard pipe-bending tools

Piping in loose sands: the importance of geometrical fixity of grains

Piping is one of the possible failure mechanism for dams and levees with a sandy foundation. Water flowing through the foundation causes the onset of grain transport, due to which shallow pipes are formed at the interface of the sandy layer and an impermeable blanket layer. In the past, the mechanism has been investigated predominantly in densely packed sands, in which the process was observed to start at the downstream side (backward erosion). Recently performed experiments in loose sand (van Beek et al. 2009) showed a different failure mechanism (forward erosion). In this article additional experiments of piping in loose sands are described for investigating the relevance of the forward process for practice. In these experiments the type of process was found to be dependent on the presence of shear resistance between sand box cover and top sand grains, that causes grains to be fixed geometrically. Without this shear resistance the process was found to be forward, whereas with this shear resistance the process was found to be backward oriented. The change in degree of fixity and relative density as a result of loading is investigated with electrical density measurements. The experiments show that the forward process is not relevant for levees in practice, in which the cohesive blanket layer causes the sand grains to be fixed properly

A technique for making clean holes in metallic piping and components

Testing was conducted to develop a technique of providing clean holes in process piping or in a metal surface accessible from one side only without disassembling the system. The method was performed on sample pieces of piping and worked successfully with no contaminants being found on the inside of the pipe. The materials tested were Inconel 600, 304 stainless steel, Hastelloy X, and ASTM-A53 black steel. The technique was developed such that it could be done in the field with hand-held power tools and a portable tungsten inert gas welding machine

The Vibroacoustic Analysis of The Hydrocarbon Processing Plant Piping System Operating at Elevated Temperature.

In this paper it is presented the vibroacoustic analysis of the selected section of the hydrocarbon processing chemical plant piping system operating at elevated temperature and subjected to dynamic load exciting vibration of the structure. The pump suction and discharge piping system is a part of chemical plant for processing hydrocarbon mixture at 270° C. Elevated temperature is one of static loads that influences the boundary conditions of the piping structure thus generating pump nozzle loadings leading to possible pump body deflection. Deflected shape of the pump body results in generation of flow fluctuation, visible and measurable as a pressure pulsation. This kind of fluctutation has been assumed further to be one of the dynamic loading on piping system structure. The dynamic analysis was performed to quantify the loading effect of pressure pulsation excited in the pump discharge nozzles on the structure of pipelines and the connected pump nozzles. The simulation was based on the numerical analysis of the excitation by acoustic waves propagation in subjected piping system. Measured on–site pressure pulsation at pumps nozzles has been identified and assumed to be the source of the acoustic waves. In the simulation elastic features of the piping structure as well as the fluid, and pressure loses in pipes, taken into account. Final result of the acoustic part of the simulation was spectral characteristics of the acoustic shock forces, defined further as harmonic loads for the dynamic structural analysis. To observe an influence of the acoustic excitation on the piping there was performed structural analysis of the piping system and the combined results of static and dynamic loading influence determined. This part of the analysis has been perfomed by means of FEM computer software Bentley AutoPIPE as well as some use of ANSYS FEM program. Important step in this simulation there was the theoretical modal analysis. This analysis allows to predict possible vibroacoustic resonance in the structural system under specific conditions of the coincidence between acoustic excitation and modals. The results of the combined static and dynamic loadings analysis contain the information on the node displacements, internal forces, resulting stresses in the pipe walls and loads on the pump nozzles and piping supports

Sediment and particulate carbon removal by pipe erosion increase over time in blanket peatlands as a consequence of land drainage

Land drainage is common in peatlands. Artificially drained blanket peat catchments have been shown to have a significantly greater soil pipe density than intact catchments. This paper investigates the role of surface land drains in the enhancement of soil piping in blanket peats. The density of piping was found to significantly increase in a linear fashion with the age of the drainage. Thirty-five years after drains were cut, slopes would be expected to have twice the density of soil piping than would an undrained blanket peat catchment. The rate of pipe erosion increases exponentially over time, so that particulate carbon loss from subsurface pipes is greatest where drains are oldest

Residual stress measurement round robin on an electron beam welded joint between austenitic stainless steel 316L(N) and ferritic steel P91

This paper is a research output of DMW-Creep project which is part of a national UK programme through the RCUK Energy programme and India's Department of Atomic Energy. The research is focussed on understanding the characteristics of welded joints between austenitic stainless steel and ferritic steel that are widely used in many nuclear power generating plants and petrochemical industries as well as conventional coal and gas-fired power systems. The members of the DMW-Creep project have under- taken parallel round robin activities measuring the residual stresses generated by a dissimilar metal weld (DMW) between AISI 316L(N) austenitic stainless steel and P91 ferritic-martensitic steel. Electron beam (EB) welding was employed to produce a single bead weld on a plate specimen and an additional smoothing pass (known cosmetic pass) was then introduced using a defocused beam. The welding re- sidual stresses have been measured by five experimental methods including (I) neutron diffraction (ND), (II) X-Ray diffraction (XRD), (III) contour method (CM), (IV) incremental deep hole drilling (iDHD) and (V) incremental centre hole drilling (iCHD). The round robin measurements of weld residual stresses are compared in order to characterise surface and sub-surface residual stresses comprehensively

Piping and woody plants in peatlands: Cause or effect?

This paper presents, for the first time, evidence to show that Calluna species are one causative factor of piping in blanket peat catchments. Ground-penetrating radar survey on 960 plots illustrated that piping was prevalent throughout blanket peats. However, soil pipe occurrence was significantly higher where bare peat (149 pipes/km) or Calluna (87 pipes/km) were present compared to other species (67 pipes/km). A case study catchment where there was an altitudinal limit to Calluna provided some control over potential factors that may lead to an association between piping and Calluna. Under the controlled conditions of topographic index, peat depth, and water table, piping was greater under the Calluna-covered peat than under other vegetation covers. Laboratory experiments demonstrated that 10 years worth of rainfall was enough to almost double the proportion of macropore flow occurring in recently colonized Calluna peatlands. This suggests that given enough water and time, the woody Calluna plants result in water being preferentially channeled through the upper peat. Improvements are therefore required in our understanding of the relationships between peatland plant nutrient and water supply and the feedbacks between ecosystem functioning and landform development. These results are also important given the propensity to encourage Calluna growth for game bird enhancement in many northern peatlands