Fatigue life evaluation of socket welded pipe with incomplete penetration defect: I-test and FE analysis

Abstract

This paper presents experimental and numerical analysis results regarding the effects of an incomplete penetration defect on the fatigue lives of socket welded pipes. For the experiment, four-point bending fatigue tests with various defect geometries (defect depth and circumferential length) were performed, and test results are presented in terms of stress-life data. The results showed that for circumferentially short defects, the fatigue life tends to increase with increasing crack depth, but for longer defects, the trend becomes the opposite. Finite element analysis showed that for short defects, the maximum principal stress decreases with increases in crack depth. For a longer defect, the opposite trend was found. Furthermore, the maximum principal stress tends to increase with an increase in defect length regardless of the defect depth.

Keywords

• Socket welded pipe
• Incomplete penetration defect
• Fatigue test
• Finite element analysis
• Stress analysis