Abstract

As electrofusion (EF) technology is widely used in connecting polyethylene (PE) pipes and other plastic pipes or composite pipes, research in safety assessment of EF joints has been of major concern. EF joints with defects are very common in practical applications. These defects may greatly reduce the mechanical performance of the EF joints and threat safety running of the pipeline system. To evaluate hazard of these defects and provide a basic understanding for the failure mechanism of EF joints, a comprehensive study on defects and failure modes is conducted in this work. The defects in EF joints are classified into four categories: poor fusion interface, over welding, voids, and structural deformity. The forming reasons of these defects are analyzed in detail. The mechanical properties of EF joint containing these defects are investigated by conducting peeling tests and sustained hydraulic pressure tests. Test results show that there are three main failure mode of EF joint under inner pressure, that is, cracking through the fusion interface, cracking through the fitting, and cracking through copper wire interface.

No abstract

Polyethylene (PE) pipes are widely used in natural gas transportation systems in urban areas nowadays. As landslide caused by earthquake would cause destructive damage to buried pipes, increasing attention is attracted to the safety of buried PE pipes under seismic load. In this paper, the deformation behavior of PE pipe subjected to seismic landslide was investigated and a related failure criterion due to yielding was proposed. Based on extensive uniaxial tensile tests, a rate-dependent constitutive model of PE was applied to simulate the mechanical behavior of PE pipes. The extended Drucker-Prager model was used for surrounding soil. In our proposed finite element model, a quartic polynomial bending deflection displacement normal to the pipeline was loaded along the axial direction of PE pipe. The numerical simulation results revealed that the main failure mode of buried PE pipe subjected to seismic landslide shifted from bending deformation to ovalization deformation with increasing bending deflection. On the basis of deformation behavior analysis, failure criterion curves were put forward, which depicts the maximum relative deflection of the pipe cross-section, and the maximum displacement of the pipe versus pipe length subjected to seismic landslide. The results may be referable for design and safety assessment of PE pipes due to seismic landslide.