Experimental stress analysis of four machined 10-in. NPS piping elbows with specified geometric distortions

Abstract

Four specially fabricated nominal 10-in. NPS, 90/sup 0/, long-radius, schedule 40, carbon-steel piping elbows, welded to short lengths of straight pipe, were stress analyzed both experimentally and analytically. One elbow had a circular cross section and a uniform wall thickness, while the other three had either a circular or elliptical cross section with either a uniform or variable wall thickness. The objectives of the tests were primarily to study the influence of out of roundness and wall-thickness variations on the stresses in piping elbows under internal pressure and/or applied moment loadings. Analytical studies were made to isolate the various effects by comparing the experimental data with theoretical baseline solutions. Results of the studies showed that analytical solutions based on no-end-effects (NEE) theory capture the major characteristics of the stress distributions for elbows loaded with pressure and/or in-plane, out-of-plane, or torsional moment loadings. Of the four second-order effects addressed in this study, and effects had the most influence on the stresses, followed in order by out of roundness, wall-thickness variations, and pressure-moment interactions. Of these, the only significant increase in maximum stresses above those predicted by NEE theory was for the case of out of roundness with internal-pressure loading.