Case Study for Fatigue Analysis in Caesar II for a typical piping system

By Anup Dey

I have taken up this topic to explain the fatigue analysis (Click here to read the basic article on Fatigue Analysis)methodology using caesar II with a
we need to calculate the thermal and pressure fluctuations the piping system will undergo in its design life. We have to calculate the worst possible cy
Lets assume we received the following data from process for a typical piping system.
Operating cycle from ambient (40°C) to 425°C (400,000 cycles anticipated)
Shutdown external temperature variation from ambient (40°C) to -20°C (300,000 cycles anticipated)
Pressurization to 5.5 Bars (400,000 cycles anticipated)
Pressure fluctuations of plus/minus 1.5 Bars from the 5.5 Bars (1,000,000 cycles anticipated)

Now, in order to do a proper fatigue analysis, these should be grouped in sets of load pairs which represent the worst-case combination of stress rang
Attached Figure, Fig.1 for proper understanding):

Fig. 1: Explanation of worst case cycle combination for fatigue analysis

From -20°C, 0 Bars to 425°C, 7 Bars.  300,000 Cycles
From 40°C, 0 Bars to 425°C, 7 Bars.:  100,000 Cycles
From 425°C, 4 Bars to 425°C, 7 Bars: 600,000 Cycles
From 425°C, 4 Bars to 425°C, 5.5 Bars: 400,000 Cycles

So in Caesar II we can define the above data as follows (Refer Fig. 2):
T1= 425°C; T2= -20°C
P1= 5.5 Bar; P2= 4 Bar  and P3= 7 Bar

Fig.2: Caesar II spreadsheet explaining the input requirement

Now go to the load case editor and define load cases as shown in Fig.3 for fatigue analysis.
Click on load cycles button to input the number of cycles calculated above.
Fig. 5: Output Screen showing Cumulative usage factor
This report lists for each load case the expected number of cycles, the allowable number of cycles (based upon the calculated stress), and the Usage Ra
summed for all selected load cases; if this sum exceeds 1.0, the system has exceeded its fatigue capabilities.
Please provide your inputs in comments section.