ARTICLE IN PRESS

International Journal of Pressure Vessels and Piping 85 (2008) 620–627

www.elsevier.com/locate/ijpvp

Allowable local thickness of wall-thinned straight pipes

in ASME Code Case N-597-2
Jai Hak Parka,, Kyu In Shina, Chi Yong Parkb, Sung Ho Leeb
a
Department of Safety Engineering, Chungbuk National University, Cheongju, Chungbuk 361-763, Republic of Korea
b
Korea Electric Power Research Institute, Yusonggu, Daejun 305-380, Republic of Korea
Received 6 February 2007; received in revised form 11 July 2007; accepted 10 August 2007

Abstract

The wall-thinning problem has become a hot issue in the assessment of the structural integrity of pipes and pipe items. A criterion is
necessary to determine the possibility of continuing use for the wall-thinned pipes detected by non-destructive inspection. The American
Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) Boiler & Pressure (B&PV) Vessel Section XI, Div. 1, Code Case N-597-2 [Requirements for
analytical evaluation of pipe wall thinning, 2003] provides the criterion. But the code case has several limitations and difficulties for
application and sometimes gives non-consistent allowable local thickness values. So works are in progress to modify and extend the code.
For that purpose, it is also necessary to understand fully the technical bases of the code case.
In Code Case N-597-2, the allowable local thickness of a thinned straight pipe is given through three different methods. Because of
different technical bases, each method gives different thickness values and sometimes gives contradictory values. So, in this paper,
attempts were made in order to propose a unified rule for the allowable local thickness and in order to remove or relax the restrictions on
the application of the code case. For this purpose, elastic stress analyses were made using the finite element method and the stress results
were examined. Based on the obtained bending stress results, a very simple procedure was proposed to obtain the consistent allowable
local thickness for the thinned straight pipes.
r 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction compared with the plastic collapse moments based on the

The wall-thinning problem has become a hot issue in the
assessment of the structural integrity of pipes and pipe
items. A considerable amount of related works has been
published to develop acceptance criteria for locally thinned
pipes and pipe components.
Miyazaki et al. [2,3] conducted monotonic bending tests
without internal pressure with locally thinned pipes in
order to evaluate the structural integrity of a power plant.
The maximum moments obtained from the tests were also
Abbreviations: ANSI, American National Standards Institute; ASME,
American Society of Mechanical Engineers; B&PV, Boiler and Pressure
Vessel; CC, Code Case; EPRI, Electric Power Research Institute; JAERI,
Japan Atomic Energy Research Institute; JIS, Japanese Industrial
Standards
Corresponding author. Tel.: +82 43 261 2460; fax: +82 43 264 2460.
E-mail addresses: jhpark@chungbuk.ac.kr (J.H. Park),
kyuinshin@hanmail.net (K.I. Shin), cypark@kepri.re.kr (C.Y. Park),
sungho@kepri.re.kr (S.H. Lee).
net-section stress approach. Kim et al. [4] proposed an
analytical method to evaluate the local allowable wall
thickness and compared it with other pipe wall thickness
criteria. Park et al. [5] reviewed and compared the existing
strength evaluation methods such as Hitachi model, JAERI
model and American Society of Mechanical Engineers
(ASME) Code Case (CC) N-597 and proposed a new
criterion. Gerber et al. [6] provided guidance and an
acceptance criterion for the evaluation of carbon steel pipes
with erosion–corrosion wall thinning. Zheng et al. [7]
proposed a modified net-section collapse failure criterion
for locally wall-thinned pipe under pure bending using 3D
finite element analysis. Krishnaswamy et al. [8] reviewed
existing analysis procedures to evaluate thinned pipes and
compared analytical predictions with experiment data from
published literature. Netto et al. [9] conducted a burst
pressure test with pipes with external corrosion defects and
proposed a simple procedure to estimate the burst pressure
of corroded pipes by using a nonlinear numerical analysis.

0308-0161/$ - see front matter r 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.ijpvp.2007.08.003
 ARTICLE IN PRESS
J.H. Park et al. / International Journal of Pressure Vessels and Piping 85 (2008) 620–627
Nomenclature
A1 area associated with material loss (mm2)
A2 area associated with reinforcement (mm2)
2C circumferential defect length (degree)
I moment of inertia of cross-sectional area (mm4)
L maximum extent of a local thinned area with
wall
p thickness less than tnom (mm)
ffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
L1 Rmin tmin (mm)
LA length of reinforcement area (mm)
Lm maximum extent of a local thinned area with
wall thickness less than tmin (mm)
Lm(a) maximum axial extent of a local thinned area
(mm)
Lm(t) maximum transverse extent of a local thinned
area (mm)
Ahammed [10] developed a deterministic model to evaluate
the remaining strength of a corroded steel pipeline over
time and also evaluated the maximum allowable failure
pressure.
Nuclear industries need a code, which can be used to
decide promptly whether repair or replacement is necessary
or not when wall-thinned pipes are found. For this
purpose, ASME CC N-597 [1] was made for the acceptance
criteria when wall thinning is found in pipes. But until now
the code is not approved by the regulatory agency, and
sometimes gives too conservative or non-conservative
values. So it is necessary to make a revised or a new code
for the wall thinning of pipes.
In this paper, backgrounds for the allowable local
thickness of straight pipes in CC N-597-2 were briefly
reconsidered. And a new procedure for the allowable local
thickness was suggested based on the elastic stress results of
the finite element analysis. Some stress results and
proposed allowable local thickness values were presented
in the previous work [11]. In the previous work, however,
the proposed allowable local thickness values were
calculated based on only one case of pipe geometries and
material properties. In this paper, two more cases of pipe
geometries and material properties were considered in the
stress analysis. It is noted that the proposed allowable local
thickness values are affected by the pipe geometries and
material properties, so the obtained allowable local
thickness values are somewhat increased compared with
the previous values [11].
2. ASME Code Case N-597-2
CC N-597-2 provides three different methods for
determining the allowable local thickness of thin-walled
straight pipes. For convenience, let the three different
methods be Method A, Method B and Method C. Method
A can be applied for local thinning with limited transverse
extent. Method B is for limited axial and transverse extent.
621
M applied moment (N m)
p inner pressure (MPa)
R mean radius of piping item (mm)
Rmin mean radius of piping item based on the
nominal outside radius and the minimum wall
thickness (mm)
Rnom nominal outside radius of piping item (mm)
Sm maximum allowable stress (MPa)
taloc allowable wall thickness (mm)
tmin minimum wall thickness required by the con-
struction code (mm)
tnom nominal thickness of pipe (mm)
Z pipe length (mm)
sb bending stress (MPa)
Method C is for unlimited transverse extent. Details of the
derivation of each method can be found in the EPRI report
[6] and Ref. [12]. In this paper, the bases of each method
are explained briefly again.
2.1. Method A: Limited transverse extent
Method A was designed using the criteria in the ANSI/
ASME B31G code. The B31G code was designed based on
the pipe rupture experiments conducted by Kiefner et al.
[13,14] with inner pressure as external force. And the code
provides methods for determining the minimum strength of
corroded pipelines without restrictions on the transverse
extent of the thinning defect [13]. But since nuclear plant
pipelines may include more bending loads than usual
pipelines, the transverse thinning extent is limited to less
pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
than Rmin tmin in CC N-597-2, where Rmin is the mean
radius of the piping item based on the nominal outside
radius and the minimum wall thickness and tmin is the
minimum wall thickness required by the construction code.
This restriction is so strictly enforced that usual dimensions
of thinning regions go beyond the restriction and this
reduces the applicability of Method A.
2.2. Method B: Limited axial and transverse extent
Method B was based on guidelines for the design of
branch connections. The guidelines include the rules for
compensating for the material lost in making the branch
opening. The allowable local thickness can be derived
considering the required excess material located near the
thinned zone. Fig. 1 shows the concept of area reinforce-
ment for local thinning wall loss. The detailed derivations
can be found in Refs. [6,11,12].
In order to obtain the bending stress in the thinned zone,
a circular flat plate with the diameter of Lm subjected to
uniform pressure was considered. With the clamped
boundary conditions, the maximum stress is expressed as
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622 J.H. Park et al. / International Journal of Pressure Vessels and Piping 85 (2008) 620–627

Lm

tp A1
1/2A2 1/2A2 tmin
tnom

LA

Fig. 1. Concept of area reinforcement for local thinning wall loss.

taloc
tmin

Z
Central node

Lm(a)

Fig. 2. Schematic diagram of thin-walled pipe.

follows: Fig. 2. Thus the circumferential thinning extent is 3601 in

the model. Only internal pressure is applied as external
3 pL2m
ðsr Þmax ¼ , (1) force. An axisymmetric thin shell equation was formulated
16 t2aloc and solved to obtain the membrane stress in the locally
where taloc and p are the thickness and the pressure, thinned region. The allowable local thickness was obtained
respectively. Since the stress on the plate is bending stress, for the given Lm(a) under the condition that the hoop
the stress is limited to 1.5 times the allowable primary stress membrane stress limit is 1.5 Sm provided that the hoop
pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
limit. Then the following relation can be obtained: stress does not exceed 1.1 Sm over a distance Rtmin .
Method C gives the allowable local thickness without
3 pL2m pRmin
2
p1:5 . (2) restriction on the transverse extent. But it gives larger
16 taloc tmin allowable local thickness compared with Method A.
This equation is reduced to the following condition given in
CC N-597-2: 3. Finite element analysis
taloc 0:353Lm
X pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi . (3) As stated above, the restriction on the transverse
tmin Rmin tmin thinning extent was imposed in Method A since nuclear
plant pipelines may include more bending loads than usual
pipelines. Thus, it is necessary to analyze the effect of the
2.3. Method C: Unlimited transverse extent transverse thinning extent on the stress increment of a wall-
thinned pipe subjected to bending moment. Using the stress
Method C was made using the rules for design by analysis results a new method for the allowable local
analysis given in ASME Sec. III, NB-3200. The rule allows thickness will be introduced.
a local primary stress limit of 1.5 Sm on hoop stress The effects of longitudinal length and circumferential
provided pthat the hoop stress does not exceed 1.1 Sm over a
ffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi length of a thinned zone on the strength of a pipe were
distance Rtmin . Here Sm is the design stress intensity in examined using finite element analysis. The finite element
ASME Sec. III. model is composed of 8-node shell elements. Fig. 2 shows a
For stress analysis, an infinitely long pipe with a mean schematic diagram of a wall-thinned pipe. The finite
radius R and a wall thickness tmin was considered in the element model was nearly the same as that used in
Method C. The pipe is thinned locally to wall thickness taloc Ref. [5] to derive Method C in CC N-597-2. However,
within the range of ðLmðaÞ =2ÞpzpðLmðaÞ =2Þ as shown in the thickness of an intact pipe is different from the model in

J.H. Park et al. / International Journal of Pressure Vessels and Piping 85 (2008) 620–627
Table 1
Pipe properties used in the analysis [12]
Case Burst test
CS-13
Material STPT 370
(JIS)
Nominal pipe outer radius, Rnom (mm) 82.6
Nominal wall thickness, tnom (mm) 10.9
Code minimum allowable wall thickness, tmin 5.08
(mm)
Pipe mean radius, Rmin, based on tmin (mm) 80.0
Code allowable stress (MPa) 124.8
Ref. [5] and the circumferential defect length can have an
arbitrary value. The thickness of an intact pipe is assumed
to be tnom instead of tmin.
In the previous stress calculation given in Ref. [11], the
model has geometries of the nominal outer radius
Rnom ¼ 200 mm, the minimum wall thickness tmin ¼ 18.63 mm
and the nominal wall thickness tnom ¼ 20 mm. The ratio of the
minimum thickness to the nominal thickness is somewhat large
compared with other cases. In this paper, we considered other
pipe geometries as given in Table 1 [12]. In the model, the pipe
length Z is 4500 mm and the symmetric boundary conditions
are applied in the z and y directions.
In this study, the longitudinal defect length ratio
(Lm(a)/L1) was assumed to have values of 0.2, 0.4, 2, 6
and 12 and the defect depth ratio (taloc/tmin) was assumed
to have values of 0.1, 0.3, 0.5, 0.75 and 1.0. Here
pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
L1 ¼ Rmin tmin . The circumferential defect length, 2C,
was assumed to have values of 151, 451, 901, 1801 and 3601.
Elastic bending stresses of wall-thinned pipes were calcu-
lated on the inside and outside surfaces of a pipe and mean
stress value was obtained.
Bending moment was applied at the end of the pipe. The
nodes on the pipe end were coupled to the central node and
the bending moment was applied at the central node. The
central node is the point located at the center of the pipe on
the pipe end plane as shown in Fig. 2. The pipe length was
taken to be long enough so that the stresses were
independent of the details of the pipe end.
Bending stresses of wall-thinned pipes were obtained for
specified values of the longitudinal defect length ratio
(Lm(a)/L1), the defect depth ratio (taloc/tmin) and the
circumferential defect length 2C for the material and
geometrical data given in Table 1. The stress results were
tabulated so that bending stress for an arbitrary size of
defect can be obtained using the linear interpolation. Part
of the bending stress results for the data of the burst test
CS-13 in Table 1 are given in Figs. 3–5. The bending stress
is the mean of two stresses on the inner and outer pipe
surfaces. In the figures, the stress values are divided by
sbðno flawÞ , the stress for an intact pipe. The stress sbðno flawÞ
is also the mean of two stresses on the inner and outer
surfaces and obtained from the finite element analysis.
ARTICLE IN PRESS
623
In order to check the accuracy of the model, bending stress
was obtained for an intact pipe and compared with the value
Surry-2
calculated from the engineering formula. When the outer
field failure radius of a pipe is 82.6 mm, the thickness is 10.9 mm and the
applied moment
pffiffiffiffi is 23.9 kN m, the obtained stress is
A106B
116:7 MPa m from the finite element analysis. It must be
229 noted that the stress is not the maximum stress but the mean
12.7 stress of two stresses ponffiffiffiffi the inner and outer pipe surfaces.
8.89 The value 116:7 MPa m is the same as the value obtained
224
from the engineering formula, sb ¼ MR/I. Here M is the
103.4 applied moment, R is the mean radius and I is the moment of
inertia of cross-sectional area.
Fig. 3 shows a variation of bending stress as a function
of the longitudinal defect length. As shown in Fig. 3(a),
bending stress decreases as the circumferential defect length
decreases for the same longitudinal defect length. In the
case of small circumferential defect length (2C ¼ 151
and 451), bending stress is greatly affected by the long-
itudinal defect length. But bending stress shows a constant
value when the circumferential defect length is 3601 and
it is also independent of the longitudinal defect length.
Figs. 3(b) and (c) show the same tendency.
Fig. 4 shows a variation of bending stress as a function
of the remaining thickness. As shown in Figs. 4(a)–(c),
bending stress decreases as the remaining thickness
increases. And Fig. 4(a) shows that for the small long-
itudinal defect length, the effect of the circumferential
defect length is very small when taloc =tmin 40:3.
Fig. 5 shows a variation of bending stress as a function
of the circumferential defect length. As shown in Fig. 5(a),
when the thickness in the thinned region is very small,
bending stress increases as the circumferential defect length
increases. But for other thickness values the bending stress
shows nearly a constant value when the longitudinal defect
length is small. The effect of the longitudinal defect length
on bending stress increases as it increases. Bending stress
increases to the bending stress at 2C ¼ 3601 as the
longitudinal defect length increases.
From the elastic stress analysis we can find the following
features:
(a) Bending stress decreases as Lm(a) increases when pure
bending moment is applied.
(b) When 2C ¼ 3601, bending stress is constant regardless
of Lm(a). The constant value scf can be calculated from
the following simple equation:
M
scf ¼ , (4)
pR2min taloc
where M is the applied bending moment.
(c) As Lm(a) decreases, bending stress increases to the value
when 2C ¼ 3601.
(d) When Lm(a) is small and taloc =tmin 40:3, bending stress
is nearly constant regardless of 2C except the case when
the thickness is very small.
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25 25
2C=15ο
2C=15ο
20 2C=45ο 20
2C=45ο
2C=90ο
2C=90ο
σb(flaw)/σb(no flaw)

σb(flaw)/σb(no flaw)
2C=180ο
15 15 2C=180ο
2C=360ο
2C=360ο
10 10

5 5

0 0
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0 1.2
Lm(a)/L1 taloc / tmin

15 15
2C=15ο
2C=15ο
2C=45ο
2C=45ο
2C=90ο
2C=90ο
10 2C=180ο 10
σb(flaw)/σb(no flaw)

σb(flaw)/σb(no flaw)

2C=180ο
2C=360ο
2C=360ο

5 5

0 0
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0 1.2
Lm(a)/L1 taloc / tmin

10 10
2C=15ο
2C=45ο 2C=15ο

2C=90ο 2C=45ο

2C=180ο 2C=90ο
σb(flaw)/σb(no flaw)
σb(flaw)/σb(no flaw)

2C=360ο 2C=180ο

5 5 2C=360ο

0 0
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0 1.2
Lm(a)/L1 taloc / tmin

Fig. 3. Variation of bending stress as a function of the longitudinal defect Fig. 4. Bending stress as a function of the remaining thickness when
length when (a) taloc/tmin ¼ 0.1, (b) taloc/tmin ¼ 0.3 and (c) taloc/tmin ¼ 0.5. (a) Lm(a)/L1 ¼ 0.2, (b) Lm(a)/L1 ¼ 1.0 and (c) Lm(a)/L1 ¼ 6.0.
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J.H. Park et al. / International Journal of Pressure Vessels and Piping 85 (2008) 620–627 625

find the allowable local thickness when Lm(a) and Lm(t)

25 (or 2C) are given. When the stress from pressure is much
larger than the bending stress, correction is not necessary.
20 Method A may be used regardless of the circumferential
defect length. When the bending stress is not small
σb(flaw)/σb(no flaw)

compared with other stresses, the allowable local thickness

15 can be obtained using the following procedures:
Lm(a)/L1=0.2
Lm(a)/L1=0.4
10 (a) The problem is to obtain the allowable local thickness
Lm(a)/L1=1.0 taloc when LmðaÞ ¼ ðLmðaÞ Þgiven and LmðtÞ ¼ ðLmðtÞ Þgiven .
Lm(a)/L1=3.0 (b) Assuming small Lm(t) (or 2C), obtain the allowable
5 Lm(a)/L1=6.0 local thickness ðtaloc Þs usingMethod A in CC N-597-2
Lm(a)/L1=12.0 for the given Lm(a).
0 (c) Using the elastic bending stress results, obtain the
0 90 180 270 360 bending stress (sb)s when LmðtÞ ¼ L1 , LmðaÞ ¼
2C(degrees) ðLmðaÞ Þgiven and thickness is ðtaloc Þs . If necessary, the
linear interpolation is used. Here L1 is the upper limit
of the circumferential defect length for which Method
10
Lm(a)/L1=0.2 A can be applied.
Lm(a)/L1=0.4 (d) Using the elastic bending stress results, obtain the
8 Lm(a)/L1=1.0 thickness that gives the same bending stress (sb)s when
LmðaÞ ¼ ðLmðaÞ Þgiven and LmðtÞ ¼ ðLmðtÞ Þgiven .
σb(flaw)/σb(no flaw)

Lm(a)/L1=3.0
Lm(a)/L1=6.0
6
Lm(a)/L1=12.0
4
2
0 obtained from Method A. And bending stress is calculated
0 90 180 270
2C(degrees)
Fig. 5. Bending stress as a function of the circumferential defect length
when (a) taloc/tmin ¼ 0.1 and (b) taloc/tmin ¼ 0.5.
(e) The effect of Lm(a) on bending stresses depends on the
ratio taloc =tmin . The effect of Lm(a) increases as the ratio
taloc =tmin decreases.
Here descriptions from (a) to (d) are for the case when the
defect thickness is fixed.
4. Proposed allowable local thickness
Method A in CC N-597-2 gives the allowable local
thickness when 2C is small, but there is a restriction on 2C.
This is because nuclear plant pipelines may include more
bending loads than usual pipelines. It is well known that
the effect of 2C is very small when only inner pressure is
applied as external load. So the maximum effect of 2C may
be the case when only bending moment is applied as the
external force.
A very simple method was proposed in order to remove
the restriction on Lm(t) in Method A. The objective is to
(e) The thickness obtained in step (d) is the allowable local
thickness, taloc, when LmðaÞ ¼ ðLmðaÞ Þgiven and LmðtÞ ¼
ðLmðtÞ Þgiven .
The idea of this proposal is as follows. When
ðLmðtÞ Þgiven 4L1 , Method A cannot be used to obtain the
allowable local thickness. So, first it is assumed that
LmðtÞ ¼ L1 , then the allowable local thickness can be
360 from the stress results table. Let the stress be (sb)s. If Lm(t)
increases from L1, the bending stress also increases from
(sb)s. In order to maintain the same stress as (sb)s, the
thickness must be increased. The proposed allowable local
thickness is the thickness with which the stress becomes
(sb)s when LmðtÞ ¼ ðLmðtÞ Þgiven . During the whole procedure
Lm(a) maintains the constant value as LmðaÞ ¼ ðLmðaÞ Þgiven .
The allowable local thickness was obtained using the
proposed method. Since the allowable local thickness
depends on the pipe geometry and material properties,
the data sets in Table 1 and Ref. [11] gave different
allowable local thickness values. The data of the burst test
CS-13 in Table 1 gave the largest allowable local thickness
values compared with two other cases. Since the allowable
local thickness values depend on the geometrical and
material data, it is possible for other data sets to give larger
thickness values than those of the burst test CS-13.
However, since the data set of the burst test CS-13 has a
very small tmin =tnom value, the allowable local thickness
values obtained from the burst test CS-13 can be used as
reference values.
The obtained allowable local thickness values are
compared with the values obtained from other methods.
Fig. 6 shows the obtained results for the case when
tmin ¼ 5.08 mm, Rmin ¼ 80.0 mm and Lm(a) ¼ 20 mm and
the longitudinal defect length, 2C, varies from 11 to 701.
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1.0 1.0

0.8 0.8

0.6 0.6
taloc / tmin

taloc / tmin
0.4 0.4

Method A
Method B Method A
0.2 0.2
Method C Method C
Prop. Method Prop. Method
0.0 0.0
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 0 10 20 30 40 50
2C(degrees) 2C(degrees)

Fig. 6. Allowable local thickness when Lm(a) ¼ 20 mm. Fig. 7. Allowable local thickness when Lm(a) ¼ 50 mm.

Method A
1.0
The shape of the defect region was assumed to be Method C
rectangular on the y–z plane. So the maximum extent of 2C=20°
local thinned area, Lm, was obtained from L2m ¼ 0.8 2C=30°
L2mðaÞ þ L2mðtÞ . The allowable local thickness values calcu- 2C=60°
lated using other methods are also given in the figure. As 2C=90°
taloc / tmin

indicated by Park et al. [5], the allowable local thickness 0.6

shows discontinuity between the methods and shows a
contradiction that the allowable local thickness decreases
as 2C increases within a certain range of 2C. The values
from the proposed method, which are denoted as ‘‘Prop.
Method’’, are also given in the figure. It can be noted that
the proposed method gives thickness less than the values
from Methods B and C when 2C is small. But it gives larger
thickness than Method C when 2C is greater than 431. And
the proposed method gives continuously growing thickness
values as 2C increases.
Fig. 7 shows another result when Lm(a) ¼ 50 mm. The
values of tmin and Rmin are the same as those in Fig. 6. It
can be noted that the thickness obtained using the
proposed method increases continuously from the value
of Method A to the value of Method C.
Fig. 8 presents the allowable local thickness values
obtained from the data of the burst test CS-13 as a function
of Lm(a)/L1. When Lm(a)/L1 and 2C values are given, the
allowable local thickness can be obtained from Fig. 8
without any other calculation. For comparison, those
values from Method A and Method C are also denoted in
the figure.
Excluding the case when Lm(a)/L1 is very small, the
proposed allowable local thickness has the value between
the two values from Method A and Method C for the given
Lm(a)/L1 when 2C is less than 301. When Lm(a)/L1 is very
small, the proposed allowable local thickness has greater
values than those from Methods A and C. And it can be
noted that there is a range of Lm(a)/L1 where the proposed
allowable local thickness has greater value than that from
Method C when 2C is greater than 601.
2C=360°
0.4
0.2
0.0
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Lm(a) / L1
Fig. 8. Proposed allowable local thickness.
5. Conclusions
A new simple method to obtain the allowable local
thickness of wall-thinned straight pipes was suggested
based on the elastic bending stress results of the finite
element analysis.
1. General allowable local thickness values are presented
as curves. Using the curves the allowable local thickness
can be obtained beyond the restriction on defect
transverse extent in CC N-597-2. The curves give non-
contradictory smooth thickness values as the transverse
extent of a local thinned area increases.
2. When simple bending moment is applied on the pipe,
bending stress decreases as the longitudinal defect length
increases for the same circumferential defect length.
3. When simple bending moment is applied on the pipe,
bending stress increases as the circumferential defect
 ARTICLE IN PRESS
J.H. Park et al. / International Journal of Pressure Vessels and Piping 85 (2008) 620–627
length increases for the same longitudinal defect length.
And bending stress is greatly affected by the long-
itudinal defect length when the circumferential defect
length is small. But bending stress shows constant value
regardless of the longitudinal defect length when the
circumferential defect length is 3601.
References
[1] ASME. ASME B&PV Sec. XI, Div. 1, ASME Code Case N-597-2.
Requirements for analytical evaluation of pipe wall thinning,
2003.
[2] Miyazaki K, Kanno S, Ishiwata M, Hasegawa K, Ahn SH, Ando K.
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