stress.
Therefore, from a practical perspective the external
loads will have a significant effect on flange stresses and no
effect on joint leakage. Conversely, if the bolts are extremely
flexible and the gasket is extremely stiff, then when the
external load is applied, the bolt load will not change and the
gasket stress will reduce in proportion to the applied load. In
this case, the flange stresses will not change, but the likelihood
of joint leakage will increase in proportion to the applied
external loads.
The actual case will be somewhere in between these two
extreme cases. If the change in bolt and gasket stress for the
previous example (NPS 26, cl.300 Series B) joint is examined
with a kamprofile gasket fitted (Fig. 1), it can be seen that the
applied bending moment has very little effect on the flange
stresses and mostly results in the gasket stress reducing. This
means that if the method used in ASME VIII, Div. 2 is applied
to this joint with a kamprofile gasket, then the flange stress
levels will be significantly over-predicted. Therefore, ideally
ASME VIII, Div.2 would be revised to incorporate joint
component mechanical interaction, such that unnecessary
conservatism is removed from the method.
NEW APPROACH PREREQUISITES
Given the preceding cautions regarding the use of the
current methods, the following points were considered
important in establishing a new method:
a) Should be based on flange rating in order to account,
in a rough non-conservative way, for creep/relaxation
b) Should include the effects of mechanical interaction
on the gasket and flange loads.
c) Limit should be established based on the likelihood of
the joint leaking, since that is the predominant failure
mode.
d) Due to a variety of unknown factors at the design stage
(assembly efficiency, additional loads, poor
fabrication tolerances, etc…) the method should be
conservative.
e) In addition, conservatism is also desired in order to
encourage better piping design.
NEW APPROACH OUTLINE
The basis of the development of the new approach was to
incorporate two established joint analysis methods in order to
determine the acceptable level of external loads on standard
piping joints. The mechanical interaction effects were assessed
using the methods outlined in Brown [12]. The level of effect
of the load transfer from the gasket and bolts as a consequence
was determined for each flange size and class. An example of
how the inclusion of elastic interaction improves the results of
the assessment, verified by comparison to Elastic-Plastic FEA
results, is shown in Fig. 5 and Fig. 6 for a NPS 14, cl.600 joint
with a spiral wound gasket. It can be seen that the gasket stress
reduction results match the FEA result much more closely
when it is included and the outcome is therefore less
conservative. At this point it is worth noting that both
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Rodabaugh and Koves also indicated a preference for
including elastic interaction effects in the analysis, for this
same reason.
The second phase of the development of the new
approach was to use the methods outlined in ASME PCC-1-
2010 Appendix O to calculate the required assembly bolt load
for each joint size and class using a spiral wound gasket and
A193-B8 cl.2 bolt material. The bolt material was selected
such that the results would be applicable to the widest range of
joints and will be conservative compared to B7 or B16 bolting
in the class 150 to class 600 ratings. The method was used, as
outlined in Brown [13], to determine the buffer against
leakage for each joint when assembled to the calculated
assembly bolt stress and with the full ASME B16.5 rating
ceiling pressure applied (from ASME B16.5 Table A-1). An
example of this is shown in Fig. 7 for the NPS 14, cl.600
example case. It can be seen that the buffer against leakage for
this case is 14% of bolt yield, which corresponds to a
reduction in gasket stress of 82.7 MPa (12 ksi) before leakage
is expect. If the gasket stress buffer is divided by the gasket
stress lost due to hydrostatic end force from the rated pressure,
then a ratio is established that represents the fraction of the
rated pressure above which the joint maybe taken prior to
leakage occurring (FM). The below Eq. 1 is then used to
determine if the applied external loads are acceptable or not.
16𝑀𝐸 + 4𝐹𝐸 𝐺 ≤ 𝜋𝐺 3 �(PR − PD ) + FM PR � [1]
Where:
ME = Operating external moment
FE = Operating external tensile force
G = Gasket reaction diameter
PR = Flange pressure rating at design temperature
PD = Flange design pressure
FM = Moment factor, in accordance with Table 2.
This moment factor (FM), without conservative
adjustment, is plotted for each of the joints examined in Fig. 8
for B16.5 flanges, Fig. 9 for B16.47 Series A flanges and Fig.
10 for B16.47 Series B flanges. It can be seen that in some
cases, there is significant additional capacity of the joint above
what would typically be considered when using the Equivalent
Pressure or Equivalent Force methods alone. However, the
graph is somewhat deceptive, since a large value of FM for a
class 150 joint will likely still be a small additional external
load when compared to the smaller values associated with
higher pressure classes (since the value of FM is multiplied by
PR).
As previously discussed, a conservative adjustment to the
raw values shown in the figures is necessary to account for
possible additional assembly and alignment issues. The values
of FM are adjusted by nominally selecting as uniform as
possible value across all joint sizes that corresponds to about
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