How to Choose a Pipe Failure Expert Witness

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What is required to perform a pipe failure analysis?

1. Stress and Deflection Analysis: It is imperative to perform an accurate stress and displacement analysis. This is the job of a mechanical engineer. Often, the stresses and deflections of the pipeline, critical to the analysis, may only be determined accurately by computer analysis.
2. Load History Analysis: An engineering analysis must be performed to assess the loading over the entire life of the pipe. This can only be performed by a mechanical engineer. The load and temperature history are critical to determining the lifespan of the pipe.
3. Structural Analysis: To determine the loads, the interaction with the supporting structure must be analyzed. Again, computer analysis is required for any system of moderate complexity. In the following common arrangement of piping and supports, computer analysis is critical to determine accurate stresses, deflections, vibrations, connection loads, seismic loads, wind loads, and code compliance.
4. Calculations: Complex supporting calculations are required to ensure that the computer output is in the expected range (i.e. garbage in, garbage out). The codes also require a multitude of calculations for compliance. Many computer applications do not consider non-linear buckling or thermal buckling of plastics. In these cases, the analyst must extract the computer output loads to perform additional simulations. In the case of fatigue failures, the expert must provide calculations to determine whether the piping was improperly designed or if excessive loading was the culprit.

To read more on what is required to perform a pipe failure analysis, download the article below.