Experimental and Finite-Element Study of Buried Pipes Connected by Bellow Joint under Axial Cyclic Loading
Publication: Journal of Pipeline Systems Engineering and Practice
Volume 12, Issue 1
Abstract
Pipeline systems are vital but are often damaged severely under earthquake actions. Because a well-designed bellow joint has a high deformation capacity and low stiffness, it can be used as a connector to protect pipes. In this work, a pipe with a bellow joint was buried in a steel box filled with soil. The pipe was fixed at one end, and an axial cyclic displacement was applied at the other end. Strain, axial force, and deformation along the pipe were collected. Results indicate that all the deformation was concentrated at the joint, while the pipe experienced no damage and was fully functional after the test. A finite-element (FE) model respectively with and without a bellow joint was then developed to comparatively study the effectiveness of the joint. The results obtained from both experiments and FE analysis show that the bellow joint can efficiently reduce the axial force and increase the deformation capacity.
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Data Availability Statement
The authors confirm that all data, models, or code that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.
Acknowledgments
The authors gratefully acknowledge the partial support of this research by the National Key Research and Development Program of China under Grant No. 2016YFC0701100, the National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant Nos. 51808380 and 51708391, the Tianjin Basic Research Program under Grant Nos. 17JCQNJC77700, 2016CJ03, and 18JCZDJC39200, and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities under Grant No. 3122018C014. The authors also want to thank the China Scholarship Council for the scholarship to enable the first author to have a year-long research stay at the University of Auckland, New Zealand.
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Published In
Journal of Pipeline Systems Engineering and Practice
Volume 12 • Issue 1 • February 2021
Copyright
© 2020 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Oct 21, 2019
Accepted: Sep 3, 2020
Published online: Nov 16, 2020
Published in print: Feb 1, 2021
Discussion open until: Apr 16, 2021
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