Experimental and Numerical Assessment on Failure Pressure of Textured Pipelines

Abstract

A series of physical tests and finite element (FE) analyses are conducted to evaluate the failure of smooth (conventional) and textured (proposed concept) pipes. To do so, hydrostatic pressure tests are performed on aluminum beverage cans (ductile failure) and additively manufactured Ti6Al4V-0406 titanium pipes (brittle failure). Mechanical material properties are obtained from tensile tests of coupon samples. In the absence of physical burst pressure tests, FE models are validated against experimental results of external pressure tests and are used to predict the buckle initiation (Pi) and burst pressure (Pb) capacity of the textured pipes with different number of circumferential triangles, N, and base angles, α. Results show that buckle initiation pressures of the textured concept is 2.34 and 1.80 times greater than those of the smooth aluminum cans and titanium pipes, respectively. However, the burst pressure of the textured pipe can only get 3% greater than the smooth pipe. Based on the current results, a textured pipe with N = 6 and α = 30 deg is the optimum textured design.