International Journal of Pressure Vessels and Piping 82 (2005) 43–50

www.elsevier.com/locate/ijpvp

Design by analysis versus design by formula of high strength

steel pressure vessels: a comparative study
A.Th. Diamantoudis*, Th. Kermanidis
Laboratory of Technology and Strength of Materials, Department of Mechanical Engineering and Aeronautics, University of Patras, Patras 26500, Greece
Received 23 July 2003; revised 28 May 2004; accepted 1 June 2004

Abstract
A comparative study for design by analysis and design by formula of a cylinder to nozzle intersection has been made using different finite
element techniques. The cylinder to nozzle intersection investigated is part of a typical vertical pressure vessel with a skirt support. For the
study the commonly used ductile P355 steel alloy and the high strength steel alloy P500 QT were considered. The comparative results clearly
show disadvantages in terms of limit load capability when the design-by-formula procedures are used in the design of high strength steel
pressure vessels. The FE results also clearly show advantages of the shell to solid sub-modeling technique, as it combines the accuracy of
3D-solid modeling with the affordable computing time of the 3D-shell modeling technique.
q 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Design by analysis; Design by formula; Limit load analysis; High strength steels; Shell-to-solid sub-modeling FEA

1. Introduction components operating in corrosive environments is

expected to be higher in thicker parts.
Industrial pressure vessels are usually structures with When using high strength steel alloys for pressure vessels
complex geometry containing numerous geometrical it can be noted that according to EN13445 code the design
discontinuities and are often required to perform under stress is derived by the formula
complex loading conditions (internal pressure, external  
Rp0;2=t Rm=20
forces, thermal loads, etc.). The design and manufacturing f Z min ; ;
1; 5 2; 4
of these products are governed by mandatory national
standards, codes and guidelines that ensure high safety where Rp0,2/t and Rm/20 are the minimum yield strength or
performance. Most pressure vessel design codes 0.2% proof strength at the calculation temperature t and
(e.g. EN13445 [1], BS550 [2], ASME DivIII [3]) assume the minimum tensile strength at 20 8C, respectively.
a membrane stress state condition for the determination of Compared to the ASME code
the minimum shell thickness and large safety factors at areas  
Rp0;2=t Rm=20
of geometric discontinuities such as openings, change of f Z min ;
curvatures, nozzle intersections, thickness reduction, etc. 1; 5 2; 14
It should be noted that large safety factors lead to increasing it can be seen that design by EN13445 leads to more
the material thickness, while safety is not necessarily conservative products for high strength materials, e.g. with
increased; recall that fracture toughness decreases with high yield to tensile strength ratio (Rp0,2/t/Rm/20), where Rm/20
increasing thickness, and stress corrosion cracking at determines the design stress. Therefore, investigations are
necessary to examine the capability of high strength steels
for design and manufacture of pressure vessels with
* Corresponding author. Tel.: C30-2610-991-027; fax: C30-2610-997-
increased levels of safety.
190. Up to the year 2000 finite element analysis was excluded
E-mail address: diamant@mech.upatras.gr (A.Th. Diamantoudis). from most national design codes. Only recently, a procedure
0308-0161/$ - see front matter q 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.ijpvp.2004.06.001
44 A.Th. Diamantoudis, Th. Kermanidis / International Journal of Pressure Vessels and Piping 82 (2005) 43–50

for estimating the lower limit load by using finite element

analysis has been introduced in Annex b of the Euro Norm
EN13445 [1]. The procedure presented in annex b of
EN13445 is referred to as ‘Design by Analysis’ (DBA), and
will be followed in the present work. So far, the most
commonly used techniques in finite element modeling
involve linear elastic and linear elastic-ideal plastic
analysis implemented in 2D and 3D-Shell element models
or 3D-Solid element models.
The majority of finite element analyses used for the
design of pressure vessels involve 2D and 3D shell element
models [4–11]. The use of this type of element allows
computation of the stress state of the component in
affordable computing time. However, the derived
values in areas with geometrical discontinuities
(nozzle intersections, weldments, etc.), where stress
singularities occur, are expected to include certain Fig. 1. Dimensions of the vessel input as parameters in the FE code.
inaccuracies as such complex geometries cannot be
modeled with shell elements and in addition, only stresses
the twice-elastic slope method [4] from the load
at limited surfaces (top-middle-bottom) may be derived.
The use of 3D-solid element models currently remains displacement curve. An additional constraint in this
limited [4]. Although the use of this type of elements results procedure is that the absolute maximum principal strain
in an accurate derivation of the stress state, the FE-models shall not exceed the value of 5%. In application rule 2,
are usually huge and require very large computing time. the primary stress intensity defined by (jsmaxKsminj) at any
In the present work a Finite Element Analysis of the location of the structure shall not be greater than RM/gR,
cylinder to nozzle intersection of a pressure vessel has been smax and smin are the maximum and minimum principal
made by developing a shell to solid finite element model to stresses, respectively. The parameters RM and gR are
achieve sufficient accuracy in affordable computing time. obtained from Table B.9-5 of annex b [1] of EN13445.
The derived stress state of the nozzle to cylinder intersection
is compared with results obtained by implementing 2.1. Case specification
traditional 3D-shell and 3D-solid models. Two different
materials: the high strength steel P500 and the conventional The example pressure vessel chosen was defined in the
low strength steel P355 have been considered for framework of the European research project ECOPRESS
comparison.
[12]. The geometry values of the pressure vessel shown in
Fig. 1 are presented in Table 1. It is a typical vertical
pressure vessel with a skirt support, and contains most of the
usually encountered critical geometrical discontinuities.
2. Design by analysis of a cylinder to nozzle intersection
The pressure vessel was designed for material P355 at a
DBA, as defined in annex b of the European standard design pressure of 8.25 MPa, according to the rules of
EN13445, provides design rules of any pressure vessel ‘Design by Formula’ of the ASME design code.
component under any action and it may be used as an
alternative to design by formula, or as a complement to Table 1
design by formula. The DBA procedure includes a check Pressure vessel dimensions
against gross plastic deformation (GPD). In the present case Parameter Dimension (mm)
study the design action is internal pressure. H 4000
The principle that defines GPD states that for any load HN1 2700
case the design action Ad, or the design effect Ed, shall not Di 2900
exceed the design resistance Rd: dN1 670
dMH 400
Ad % Rd or Ed % Rd (2.1) hN1 200
hMH 170
Specifically, the design check for GPD may be conducted tc 50
by means of two application rules specified in annex b of ts 27
Ref. [1]. In application rule 1, the design action shall be less tN1 135
tMH 100
than the lower bound limit load divided by a partial safety Fillet 12
factor gR. The lower bound limit load may be derived using
 A.Th. Diamantoudis, Th. Kermanidis / International Journal of Pressure Vessels and Piping 82 (2005) 43–50 45

Fig. 2. True stress–strain curves of the materials used for the non-linear
elastic-plastic analyses.

In Fig. 2 the material characteristics of (a) the steel alloy Fig. 4. Flowchart of the sub-modeling technique.
P355 and (b) the steel alloy P500 [13] are presented.
From preliminary FE calculations, as can be seen from
the hoop stress distribution depicted in Fig. 3, it can be
concluded that the high stressed area is the intersection of
the side nozzle with the cylindrical part of the vessel,
reaching a maximum hoop stress of 500 MPa.

2.2. FE modeling

Due to the complexity of the structure the stress analysis

and the derivation of principal stresses, required for the
DBA procedure, is performed by finite element analysis
using shell to solid sub-modeling techniques to achieve
accuracy in affordable computing time. The results of this
technique are compared with results obtained by using
the common 3D-shell or 3D-solid element FE modeling
techniques. Fig. 5. Schematic representation of the sub-modeling technique.

Fig. 3. Hoop stress distribution along a section of the vessel. Fig. 6. Cut boundary section convergence graph.
46 A.Th. Diamantoudis, Th. Kermanidis / International Journal of Pressure Vessels and Piping 82 (2005) 43–50
Fig. 7. Exploded view of the 3D-solid sub-model and the 3D-shell model.
Sub-modeling as described in Ref. [14] is a finite element
technique based on the methodology of sub regions, which
contain singularities, geometry discontinuities, or corrosion
induced material degradation areas. For the sub-region one
can create a sub-model with fine mesh while keeping the full
model with a coarse mesh. This methodology is also known
as the cut boundary displacement method. The boundary of
the sub-model represents the cut through the coarse model.
The coarse model can be meshed by solid or shell
elements. Displacements calculated along the boundary of
the coarse model are specified as boundary conditions for
the sub-model.
Fig. 8. Full 3D-solid element mesh model.
The benefits of such a technique are obvious, when one
compares the computing time of a shell-to-solid sub-model
and its corresponding full 3D-model (as shown in Fig. 11).
The optimum dimensions for the cut section of the
sub-model in this study were a result of a parametric
study, as shown in Fig. 4. Starting at a boundary away
from the line of intersection of the nozzle, the boundary
was increased stepwise until the desired accuracy, was
obtained (Fig. 5).
The present FE analysis was conducted with the use of
the commercial FE software ANSYS 5.7, and a self-written
ANSYSw-macro routine that calculates the boundary
conditions and transfers them to the sub-model. Fig. 6
depicts the percentage difference of the maximum stresses
at the nozzle intersection between two consecutive
numerical solutions. The convergence of the numerical
calculation of the cut-boundary section can be seen. Fig. 7
presents the coarse and solid sub-model meshes. Details of
the full 3D-solid model are shown in Fig. 8.
2.3. Comparison of the finite element models
Three different FE models (a) the Full 3D-model, (b) Full
Shell model and (c) Sub-model have been used for the
calculation of the stress state within the nozzle to cylinder
intersection. In Figs. 9 and 10 the hoop stress distribution
along the longitudinal and perimetric cut-section,
respectively, at the inner surface of the cylinder are presented
for all three models. The analysis was performed using an
 A.Th. Diamantoudis, Th. Kermanidis / International Journal of Pressure Vessels and Piping 82 (2005) 43–50 47

Fig. 9. Hoop stress distribution of nozzle intersection (inner surface).

operating pressure of 8 MPa. From Figs. 9 and 10 it can be
seen that the sub-model results are very close to those of the
3D-full model. Concerning CPU time, as shown in Fig. 11 the
sub-model technique leads to a 65% reduction of CPU time.
3. DBA versus DBF limit load analysis
Elastic-plastic finite element analysis, using the true stress
true strain data of Fig. 2, has been conducted for both
materials (a) P355 and (b) P500 to predict the limit load
capabilities of the above mentioned pressure vessel and to
evaluate the effectiveness of the applicability of the design
rules according to EN13445 for high strength steels.
The internal pressure was increased incrementally from the
design pressure in steps of 1 MPa. The maximum principal
strain at the most critically stressed element and the radial
displacement of the pressure vessel are recorded for each
load step and are presented in Figs. 12 and 13. The limit load
obtained from the analysis is 14.5 MPa for the P355 vessel

Fig. 10. Hoop stress distribution of nozzle intersection (perimetric section).

48 A.Th. Diamantoudis, Th. Kermanidis / International Journal of Pressure Vessels and Piping 82 (2005) 43–50

Fig. 11. CPU run time for three models.

and 22.5 MPa for the P500 vessel. These results are within in EN13445. The general formula used for the calculation of
the restriction of 5% maximum principal strain as mentioned the maximum permissible pressure in EN13445 for
in Section 2 of this paper. The material parameters used for cylindrical pressure vessels is:
the DBA are presented in Table 2.
The maximum permissible pressure according to DBA is 2fzea
Pmax Z
obtained by dividing the limit load obtained by the safety Dm
factor gR. For the two materials we have:
where:
† P355: PmaxZ(Limit Load)/gRZ11.6 MPa
† P500: PmaxZ(Limit Load)/gRZ17 MPa f nominal design stress
z weld coefficient
The maximum permissible pressure according to the ea analysis thickness
rules of DBF is calculated as laid out in Section 7.6.6.3 Dm mean pressure vessel diameter

Fig. 12. Maximum principal strain increase of critical element.

 A.Th. Diamantoudis, Th. Kermanidis / International Journal of Pressure Vessels and Piping 82 (2005) 43–50 49

Fig. 13. Radial displacement of pressure vessel.

The resulting maximum permissible pressure Pmax for 4. Conclusions

both materials obtained from the finite element analysis
results according to DBA and according to DBF In this paper we compared the design of pressure vessels
calculations are presented in Table 3. of high strength steel P500 with the steel alloy P355 using
It should be emphasized at this point that the the rules of DBA and DBF. The conclusions drawn from this
percentage increase of the maximum permissible pressure study can be summarized as follows:
for the high strength steel P500 is much larger than for
P355, which demonstrates that steel alloys with high † the application of DBA leads to much less conservative
Yield to Tensile ratio are penalized when DBF rules are design parameters.
followed. This is mainly caused due to the restrictive † the high strength steel P500 is severely punished when
formula, Design by Formula rules are applied, instead of DBA
methodology.
 
Rp0;2=t Rm=20
f Z min ;
1; 5 2; 4
Acknowledgements
of DBF by which the design stress is obtained.
The authors acknowledge E.C. for funding the European
project ECOPRESS. The authors also express their gratitude
Table 2 to Guy Baylac technical advisor of EPERC for his valuable
Mechanical properties and DBA safety factors of the two alloys insight in the subject of this study.
P355 P500
Yield/tensile ratio Rp0,2/t/Rm/20Z0.72 Rp0,2/t/Rm/20Z0.85
Safety factor gR 1.25 1.3383 References
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