Welding of field joints for pipelines internally lined with thin-film heat sensitive materials

1. Introduction

One of the leading causes of steel pipeline failure is the internal corrosion of the steel
pipes, either by the transported fluid itself or by microbiological agents. According to the United
States Department of Transportation – Pipeline and Hazard Materials Safety Administration,
from 1998-2017 approximately 12% of pipeline incidents were caused by internal corrosion.
Depending on the case, steel pipelines are required to be internally lined to protect the pipe
from internal corrosion and/or to prevent contamination of the transported fluid with corrosion
by-products.
Various internal lining materials may be selected by engineers depending on project
requirements and the engineer’s preference. These linings are usually thermally sensitive
materials such as thin-film liquid epoxy, fusion bonded epoxy, or polyurethane.
Welded field joints are generally recognized as the most efficient and economical process
of fabrication of pipelines from individual steel pipes. The most common welded joint methods
are butt-welding, bell and spigot lap welding, and butt strap lap welding. All these methods
would damage a thermally sensitive internal lining in the immediate area of the weld zone.
Therefore, the internal lining is held back in this area and usually patched afterwards by manual
or robotic means.
Proper patching of epoxies and polyurethanes requires abrasive blasting, cleaning,
material application, curing, and inspection of each joint. This process is very time consuming
and may severely slow down pipeline construction. Furthermore, there exists a significant risk
of patch failure due to common factors that affect the quality of field-applied thermally sensitive
protective materials: temperature, humidity, dust, difficulty inspecting surface preparation, and
a host of other factors that are difficult to mitigate in the ever-changing field environment.
Lastly, putting humans inside of pipelines to patch joints brings safety risks typical of confined
space entry: asphyxiation from carbon monoxide or other gases, explosion hazards, heat
exposure, poisonous animals and difficulty extracting injured personnel.
Robotic patching of the weld region also poses important challenges. All the above-
mentioned factors that may promote manual patch failure are present, and the internal weld
bead must be regular and smooth, to allow for proper fusion bonded epoxy coverture without
pinholes. The need for an additional interface with a third-party contractor, whose agenda may
or may not be aligned to the objectives of the pipeline main construction job may also be a
significant problem.
Internal joint protection sleeves have been developed for quite some time to protect the
interior of butt-welded steel pipe joints from corrosion. During new construction, one of these
sleeves is inserted into pipe ends and protects the bare steel of the weld zone from corrosion.
The sleeves are machined from mechanical steel tubing, are provided with a thermally sensitive
lining similar to the parent pipe lining material and use rubber seals and epoxy paste to prevent
water from reaching the weld zone. Insulation is incorporated into the sleeve body to prevent
the welding heat from damaging the sleeve lining. Historically, these sleeves have been used
on small diameter pipelines due to their rigid construction which makes installation and sealing
challenging, as the pipes are not perfectly circular, and even more challenging on larger
diameter pipe, since the sleeves are heavy and the pipes have relatively large tolerances for out
of roundness.
Recently, a new internal joint protection sleeve was developed that is molded from sheet
metal and uses a new rubber seal design that eliminates the need for an epoxy paste. The new
internal joint protection sleeve is flexible and lightweight, allowing for easy installation and is
crucial to achieve proper sealing. Its flexibility makes it possible for much easier installation in
larger diameter pipelines which have pipe ends that are more out of round than small diameter
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pipe. Importantly for many waterworks projects, it is suitable for use with externally welded
lap weld joints where thin-film linings have often not been used due to the difficulty patching
the internal joint area. This internal joint protection sleeve opens the possibility of using well-
proven, lightweight, and flexible thin-film linings for water pipelines and entirely avoids the
time-consuming and error-prone process of patching after the weld is complete.

2. Basic Design

The internal joint protection sleeve comprises two layers of rolled sheet metal with an
insulation material sandwiched in-between. The internal layer of sheet metal is coated with a
thermally sensitive protective material that prevents corrosion of the internal sleeve. It may or
may not be the same protective material used to protect the interior of the steel pipe. A rubber
bore seal is placed at each end of the internal sleeve. When installed, the seals are compressed
between the lined ends of the internal sleeve and the pipe internal lining, making for a self
energizing watertight seal assembly. Figure 1 shows a 30 in internal joint protection sleeve.

Figure 1 – 30 in internal joint protection sleeve.

Source: Produced by the authors

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 Welding of field joints for pipelines internally lined with thin-film heat sensitive materials

When used with butt-weld joints, the raised portion at the center of the external surface
of the internal sleeve welds to the root pass to hold the sleeve in place, as shown in Figure 2
below. When used with lap-weld joints, the raised portion is offset to be held between the end
of the spigot and the bell (or pipe end in the case of butt-strap joints), as shown in Figure 3
below.

Figure 2. - Cross section of assembled butt-weld joint.

Source: Produced by the authors

Figure 3. - Cross section of assembled lap-weld joint.

Source: Produced by the authors

3. How the internal protection sleeve works

The main function of the internal joint protection sleeve is to protect the bare steel pipe
surface of the weld zone from corrosion. To do so, it must prevent the water in the pipeline to
reach the bare steel surface behind the sleeve. This is accomplished by means of rubber bore
seals that fit onto the sleeve ends and are compressed between the lined surface of the sleeve
and the internal pipe lining, as shown in Figures 2 and Figure 3.
The flexibility of the sleeve is vital to achieving a seal because it: a) allows the sleeve to
conform to the shape of the pipe ends and b) allows the sleeve to expand under pipeline
pressure. When the sleeve conforms to the pipe shape, it produces an uniform sealing pressure
around the entire circumference of the pipe. When the sleeve expands under pipeline pressure
it further compresses the bore seals against the pipe lining to produce an even tigther seal.
Hydrostatic tests prove the sealing performance of the sleeve, as shown in the Shop Testing
section of this paper.
The sleeve coating must also remain intact after being exposed to the welding heat. The
insulation layer embedded in the sleeve prevents weld heat from transferring straight
underneath the weld to the sleeve coating. Instead, the heat travels alongside the external ring
of the sleeve and through the large heat sink that is the pipe wall. During ordinary welding

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procedures, the sleeve coating slowly heats with the subsequent weld passes, but peak
temperatures remain under 155º C (311º F) on small diameter pipe, and then only for a few
minutes as shown in the Shop Testing section of this paper. Large diameter pipe does not present
heat concerns to the sleeve coating because the joint has time to cool down before the
subsequent weld pass arrives in the same location again.
The sleeve must also be easily and quickly installed in the field, to allow for fast and
economical pipeline construction. The fact that the sleeve is fabricated from sheet metal allows
it to sufficiently flex and conform to the shape of pipe ends that are within the roundness
tolerance specified in the pipe manufacturing codes. A silicone lubricant is used to reduce
friction of the rubber seals against the bare steel and internal pipe lining during insertion.

4. Shop tests

Hydrostatic tests are performed on fully assembled joints with the internal joint protection
sleeve to prove the sealing functionality. Prior to the hydrostatic test, holes are drilled through
the pipe wall at the location where the sleeve is, a gap is left in the weld, or the joint is assembled
without a weld. Any water that leaks behind the bore seals during pressurization would be seen
exiting the holes or unwelded joint. The following are two hydrostatic test arrangements and
results that are typical of the various hydrostatic tests that have been performed:

4.1. Hydrostatic test A.

NPS 12 Schedule 40 pipe. Girth weld completed with a 1” gap left in weld. Pipe
pressurized to 38 bar (551 psi) and held for 30 minutes. No water leakage out of weld gap and
no loss of pressure during the test. Joint assembly, welding, and hydrostatic test witnessed by
client in Oakland, CA on November 2, 2021. Figures 4 and 5 show aspects of the test.

Figure 4. - NPS 12 schedule 40 joint with internal joint protection sleeve, being welded.

Source: Produced by the authors

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 Welding of field joints for pipelines internally lined with thin-film heat sensitive materials

Figure 5. - Hydrostatic test on NPS 12 schedule 40 pipe joint with internal sleeve. Tested at 38 bar (551 psi) for
30 minutes.

Source: Produced by the authors

4.2. Hydrostatic test B.

NPS 6 Schedule 80 pipe. Sleeve inserted into two short pipe pups. Joint was left unwelded
after assembly. Pipe pups placed between two blind flanges, Assembly pressurized in stages to
315 bar (4,480 psi) over the course of 7 hours and held for 2 hours at 315 bar. No water leakage
out of unwelded joint and no loss of pressure at any stage during test. Test date December 1,
2020. Figure 6 shows a collage of photos from this test.

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 Jose Anisio de Oliveira e Silva, Ryan Sears

Figure 6. - Hydrostatic test on NPS 6 Schedule 80 pipe. Incrementally raised to 315 bar (4,480 psi). Total test
duration was 9 hours. Photos of test setup, unwelded joint, and post-test sleeve inspection.

Source: Produced by the authors

4.3. Sleeve coating heat exposure tests.

Welding tests have been performed on pipe joints with internal joint protection sleeves to
ascertain the sleeve linings’ exposure to heat and verify it is below the dry heat temperature
limits that the sleeve lining can withstand. The tests involved thermocouples attached to the
sleeve coating and infrared imaging. See Figure 7 for sleeve coating heat exposure results from
7 different welding tests of NPS 6 Schedule 40 pipe (7.11mm / .280” thick pipe wall). Joints
welded with 3mm E6010 stick rod, downhill stringers, maximum interpass temperature120ºC
(248º F). Thermocouples attached to sleeve center and ends. Note that the welding tests were
performed with the same parameters but with different insulation materials embedded in the
sleeves.

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 Welding of field joints for pipelines internally lined with thin-film heat sensitive materials

Figure 7. - Sleeve coating heat exposure test results of 7 different weld tests on NPS 6 schedule 40 pipe joints.

Source: Produced by the authors

5. Field trial.

An oil & gas client in California, USA installed an internal joint protection sleeve in a
pipeline to determine its effectiveness in protecting the joint interior from corrosion. It was
decided to place the sleeve in the most challenging application in their network of pipelines to
determine if they could approve it for use in any pipeline in their system.

5.1. Field Trial Description.

NPS 6 Schedule 80 pipeline. Internal sleeve installed in a joint immediately after a NPS
4 x NPS 6 reducing elbow that connected to a pump with a NPS 4 outlet. Flow is extremely
turbulent at this location with a rate of 13 ft. per second. Pipeline operating pressure is 103 –
124 bar (1,500 – 1,800 psi). Service is produced water injection with a temperature of 43º - 88º
C (110º - 190º F).

5.2. Results.

The pipeline was taken out of service and the internal joint protection sleeve was
inspected using a video camera after 4.5 months of service. No adverse issues were observed
on the sleeve, but the pipe internal lining had several blisters. The pipeline was put back into
service and as of the writing of this paper the sleeve has been in service for 10 months. Figure
8 shows a collage of photographs from the field trial installation.

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 Jose Anisio de Oliveira e Silva, Ryan Sears

Figure 8. - Internal joint protection sleeve installed for field trial in 6” dia. schedule 80 pipe under aggressive
conditions. Video still from inspection after 4.5 months of service.

Source: Produced by the authors

6. Full scale field installation.

The internal joint protection sleeve was used for a NPS 28 and NPS 24 x 92 kilometers
(57-mile) potable water pipeline in Brazil. The pipeline was constructed with butt-strap joints,
which are somewhat similar to bell and spigot joints. The edge of the butt strap was fillet welded
to the exterior of the spigot pipe.
The contractor was falling behind schedule on the project due to the slow process of
manually patching the bare steel underneath each joint with an epoxy putty. Additionally, joint
patching quality issues and safety issues from personnel entering the pipe were of concern.
COPASA, the water agency for the State of Minas Gerais, in Brazil, approved the use of the
sleeve after witnessing and manually inspecting a sleeve installation in a pipe joint using the
project pipe, and after witnessing an 8-day hydrostatic test of a joint using the sleeve without a
weld.
The contractor ended up installing 432 internal joint protection sleeves for the project,
utilizing them on some construction spreads for the tie-in welds. Short strings made of 4 60 ft
pipes each were welded outside the trench and tied into the pipeline. The sleeves were used
only for tie-in joints in the trench, and manual joint patching was used for the joints welded
outside the trench.
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 Welding of field joints for pipelines internally lined with thin-film heat sensitive materials

The contractor compared construction speed and costs where the internal joint protection
sleeve was employed versus construction speed and costs where manual joint patching was used
and found that the sleeve increased productivity by 28% and reduced construction costs by
19%.
As of the writing of this paper the sleeves have been in service for 12 months with no
adverse issues reported. Figure 9 shows a collage of photos from this project.

Figure 9. - Internal joint protection sleeve used in NPS 28” and NPS 24 x 92 km potable water pipeline with
butt-strap welded joints. Project was for COPASA, the water agency for the State of Minas Gerais, Brazil.

Source: Produced by the authors

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 Jose Anisio de Oliveira e Silva, Ryan Sears

7. Final remarks.

Shop tests and field trials have proven the internal joint protection sleeve to be an effective
method for protecting the internal bare steel of a welded pipeline joint from corrosion. A full-
scale installation has proven the sleeve to be consistently installed with a speed that
outperformed manual patching of the internal joint lining while eliminating quality concerns
associated with manual field patching.
The internal joint protection sleeve, currently being produced in the range from NPS 4 to
NPS 52, is a viable option to facilitate construction of steel water pipelines internally lined with
thin-film thermally sensitive materials. It reduces risks of internal joint patch failure due to
environmental conditions or manual error and significantly increases construction speed when
compared to manually or robotically applied internal joint patches.

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