Many studies have examined the problem of developing an approximate method to calculate the stress-strain state of self-compensating pipes, which are long pipes with a rectilinear axis and a helical corrugation. In this study the authors studied the elastoplastic stress-strain state of such pipes when they are subjected to axial tensile forces of different magnitude. Results of this study show that the shell of revolution which modeled the pipe is stiffer than the actual pipe in the circumferential direction. Since the maximum circumferential strains are considerably less than the corresponding meridional strains, the relative difference between the intensity of the shear strains in the calculation and the experiment is no more than 10% of the experimental values.