GRE PIPING STRESS ANALYSIS

GRE and FRP products are lightweight, require minimal maintenance, are highly durable and
corrosion resistant, and are ideally suited to extreme marine and offshore environments.
GRP products being proprietary the choice of component sizes, fittings and material types are
limited depending on the supplier. Potential GRP vendors need to be identified early in design
stage to determine possible limitations of component availability. The mechanical properties
and design parameters vary from vendor to vendor. So, it is utmost important that before you
proceed for stress analysis of such systems you must finalize the GRP/FRP/GRE vendor.

GRE-General
GRE STRESS ANALYSIS
Design Code for GRE stress analysis shall be as per either UKOOA or ISO 14692. The GRE
pipe properties are varying from one vendor to another and the Outer diameter (OD) is not
same as metallic pipe Outer diameter (OD). For example, the OD for 6” is 165.1mm where as
in metallic pipe it is 168.3 mm. Before carrying out the stress analysis the following information
shall collect from GRE vendor.

1. Physical Properties:
 Pipe Outer Diameter (OD)
 Wall Thickness (t)
 Bend Radius
 Flange dimension and weight

 Mechanical Properties:
 Density
 Modulus of Elasticity
 Poisson ratio
 Thermal Expansion Co efficient
 Long term axial Stress at 0:1 [al (0:1)]
 Long term axial Stress at 1:1 [al (1:1)]
 Long term axial Stress at 2:1 [al (2:1)]
 Long term hoop Stress at 1:1 [hl (1:1)]
 Long term hoop Stress at 2:1 [hl (2:1)]
 Qualified Stress for Bends/Joints (Qs)
 Bi axial stress ratio for Bends/Joints (r)
 Ratio of shear modulus to Axial Modulus
 Thermal factor(k)
INPUT
1. Piping Code
Drop down the piping Code and select ISO 14692 code.

2. Diameter and Thickness

Enter the Diameter and Thickness as per Vendor Catalogue

Enter -Mill Tolerance = 0.Mill tolerance for GRE pipe is zero since
the pipe ID is controlled by fixed mandrel.

For GRE Corrosion allowance is Zero. However

as per project specification enter the CA.

Enter Pipe Density as per Vendor Catalogue

Enter -Bend Radius as per vendor catalogue.

In metallic piping, for Long radius elbow it will be

1.5 times the Pipe OD. However in GRE the bend
radius will vary from one size to another.
3. Material Properties

Select the Piping Material as (20) FRP

Catalogue

Enter Elastic Modulus and Poisson ratio as per

vendor Catalogue

Major poison ratio from vendor catalogue

Left blank for Simplified Envelope. Generally

GRE Vendor used this Method only

Enter the material allowable stress as per

vendor catalogue.

A1-Partial Factor for Temperature

The effect of temperature on reduction of

mechanical properties shall be accounted for by
the partial factor A1 .

If the operating temperature is less than or equal to

85°C, then A1 is generally equal to 1.0

(The vendor will provide the partial factors based

on the design temperature)

A2-Partial Factor for chemical Resistance

The effect of chemical degradation shall be

accounted for by the partial factor A2 for chemical
resistance.

If the normal service fluid is water, then A2 = 1

 A3-Partial Factor for Cyclic service.

If the predicted number of pressure or other loading cycle

is less than 7000 over the design life, the service shall be
considered static and A3=1.

If the predicted number of pressure or other loading

cycles exceeds 7000 over the design life, partial factor for
cyclic service shall be determined based on ISO 14692-3
Annex-A.

Cyclic loading is not necessarily limited to pressure

loads. Thermal and other cyclic loads shall therefore be
considered when assessing cyclic severity.

Enter the System Design factor for

SUS case=0.67;OPE =0.83 and OCC=0.89.

For easy way, keep SDF as 0.67 in the input and for
OPE and OCC SDF can be controlled in load case.

For OPE=0.83/0.67=1.24

For OCC=0.89/0.67=1.33

System Design Factor for various load cases:

 Enter the Thermal factor;

0.85 for liquids and 0.8 for gasses.

The expansion will be calculated the based this

value.

Changes in length due to thermal

(ΔL) = Thermal factor X L X α X (ΔT)

L=Length; α=Expansion Co efficient ;

(ΔT) Change in temperature

4.Defining Welding Tee

For Tee, weldolet shall be defined as Qualified Tee. CII will calculated the SIF.
However, as per ISO 14692, the maximum SIF may be 2 to 2.5.

5.Defining Bend

4
 1.Enter the bend radius as per Vendor catalogue.

2. Enter the Fitting thickness. In general for GRE the fitting thickness is 1.5 to 2 times higher
than the pipe thickness.

3.Enter the bend flexibility factor (K factor) as per vendor catalogue. If value not provided by
vendor, left blank. CII will calculate the K factor as per Code.

4. Enter EpTp/EbTb value as per vendor catalogue. Ep and Eb are the axial modulus of the
attached pipe and the bend respectively, Tp and Tb are the average wall thickness of the
attached pipe and the bend respectively.

6. Special Execution Parameters:

4
 1.Activate the bourdon effect in “Translation and Rotation”

2. Enter the Co efficient of thermal expansion as per vendor catalogue

3.Enter the Ratio of shear modulus Axial modulus as per vendor catalogue.

4. Enter the laminate type as per vendor catalogue. There are three types of laminate in Caesar.

Type:1.CSM and Woven Roving

Chopped strand mat (CSM) and woven roving (WR) construction with internal and external surface
tissue reinforced layer.

Type:2.CSM and Multi-filament

Chopped strand mat and multi-filament roving construction with internal and external surface tissue
reinforced layer.

Type:3.CSM

All chopped strand mat construction with internal and external surface tissue reinforced layer.

CII uses this entry to calculate the flexibility and stress intensity factors of bends; therefore,
this default entry may be overridden using the Type field on the bend auxiliary dialog boxes.

7. Load Cases
As per ISO 14692 code there are three types stress cases only need to be considered.
1. Sustained Case
2. Operating Case
3. Occasional Case
Hydro test shall be considered as Occasional case. In GRE, there is no expansion case.
Sample load case to be considered in GRE stress analysis:

1. WW+HP …………………….(HYD)
2. W+T1+P1 …………………..(OPE) DESIGN MAX TEMPERATURE
3. W+T2+P1 …………………..(OPE) OPERATING TEMPERATURE
4. W+T3+P1 …………………..(OPE) DESIN MIN TEMPERATURE
5. W+P1 ………………………..SUSTAINED
6. W+T2+P1+WIN1 ………..…(OPE) OPERATING TEMPERATURE+ WIND(NS)
7. W+T2+P1+WIN2 ………..…(OPE) OPERATING TEMPERATURE+ WIND(EW)
8. W+T2+P1+U1 ………..…….(OPE) OPERATING TEMPERATURE+ SEISMIC(NS)
9. W+T2+P1+U2 ………..…….(OPE) OPERATING TEMPERATURE+ SEISMIC(VERT)
10. W+T2+P1+U1 ………..…….(OPE) OPERATING TEMPERATURE+ SEISMIC(EW)
11. L6-L3 ………..………….….ALG-(OCC) WIND (NS) ONLY
12. L7-L3 ………..………….…. ALG- (OCC) WIND (EW) ONLY
13. L8-L3 ………..………….…. ALG- (OCC) SEISMIC (NS) ONLY
14. L9-L3 ………..………….…. ALG- (OCC) SEISMIC (VERTICAL) ONLY
15. L10-L3 ………..………….…. ALG- (OCC) SEISMIC (ES) ONLY
16. L13+L14+L15 ………..…… SRSS-.(OCC) SEISMIC (ES) ONLY
17. L5+L11 ………..…… ABS-.(OCC) SUS+ WIND(NS)
18. L5+L12 ………..…… ABS-.(OCC) SUS+ WIND(EW)
19. L5+L16 ………..…… ABS-.(OCC) SUS+ SEISMIC
Stress Check:
HYD: L1 Consider as Occasional
SUS:L5
OPE:L2 to L4
OCC: L17 to L19

As per ISO 14692- Code, the load case combination considered are as below,
8. Code Stress Calculation
As per ISO 14692 Code, the stresses are calculated for Straight pipe, Bend and Joints
differently with different allowable.
Sample Vendor Material Properties (FPI)
References:

EngineeringGuide.pdf