The application of ceramic technology in spherical pipe joints

Abstract

Spherical pipe joints are prone to cold welding and wear, which may lead to seal failure under extreme conditions. To solve this problem, the application of ceramic technology in the spherical pipe joints is discussed in this paper. Both numerical simulations and experiments were performed for different types of coating material and different coating thicknesses. The results have demonstrated that the application of a ceramic coating could improve the sealing performance of spherical pipe joints. However, the performance was even better when a fully ceramic cone was used instead. Under the same initial torque, the number of usage cycles was much higher for the fully ceramic cone than for the coated cone, and abrasive wear was very slight. The results are expected to serve as reference for improving the sealing performance of spherical pipe joints.