Limit Loads for Circular Wall-Thinned Feeder Pipes Considering Bend Angle

In CANDU, feeder pipes supply heavy water to pressure tube and steam generator. Under service conditions, Flow-Accelerated Corrosion (FAC) produces local wall-thinning in the feeder pipes. The wall-thinning in these pipes affects the integrity of the piping system, as verified in previous research. This paper provides limit loads for wall-thinned feeder pipes with 45 degrees and 60 degrees bend angles, and proposes an equation that predicts the limit loads for wall-thinned feeder pipes with arbitrary bend angles. On the basis of finite element limit analyses, limit loads are obtained for wall-thinned feeder pipes under in-plane bending and internal pressure. There are two cases of in-plane bending: the in-plane closing direction and the in-plane opening direction. The material is considered the effect of the large deformation, so an elastic-perfectly-plastic material is assumed in the calculations.