A new look at the external pressure capacity of sandwich pipes

Sandwich Pipes (SPs) have been developed to overcome the required flow assurance and pressure capacity issues in deep and ultra-deep waters. This research aims at studying the influence of certain structural parameters on the pressure capacity (also referred to as the plastic buckling pressure) of Sandwich pipelines. The use of high grade steel pipes, as the internal or external pipes, has also been considered as one of the design parameters in this study. Moreover, a comprehensive parametric study, considering a practical range of the parameters that influence the response of SPs (and considering 3840 SP configurations) was conducted. The results from this large array of pipes were used to formulate a practical equation, capable of estimating the plastic buckling pressure of SPs. The accuracy of the proposed equation was evaluated by comparing the results with the experimental and numerical results available in the literature. The comparative results demonstrated that the proposed equation could predict the buckling capacity of such pipes with a reasonable accuracy. Furthermore, the proposed equation was used, along with a general optimization procedure, to establish the most optimum and cost-effective combination of structural parameters for SPs suitable for use in various water depths. (c) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.