Quickly analyze the limit load of thinning defect elbows with elastic modulus adjustment method

Abstract In the process of production and service of pressure pipeline, local thinning defects may occur due to dielectric corrosion, manufacturing defects and other reasons. These defects reduce the carrying capacity of the pipeline and lead to leakage and rupture of the pipeline. Therefore, the integrity assessment of components and structures is required. Traditionally, the inelastic finite element method (FEM) is highly dependent on the specification of adequate mesh density and an assurance of numerically stable solutions. However, in engineering design, independent validation methods, such as Elastic Modulus Adjustment Procedures (EMAP), provide fast and stable solutions at relatively low cost. On the basis of elastic finite element analysis (FEA), the upper and lower bounds of limit load can be obtained by specifying the variations of elastic modulus in EMAP method. In this paper, an elastic modulus adjustment parameter k , which can improve the convergence of EMAP, is used to achieve stable convergence in the application of elbow with double defects. The EMAP method is also proved to be more efficient than the inelastic finite element analysis (FEA). Furthermore, the effect of defect size and distribution on the limit load of the elbow is studied.