Becht Engineering has extensive experience and expertise in the field of Fitness-For-Service. We have performed evaluations for all of the damage mechanisms covered in ASME FFS-1/API 579 for clients around the world. We have performed Fitness-For-Service evaluations on piping, pressure vessels, heat exchangers and tanks.
Bringing Order and Logic to the Evaluation Process There is a multitude of documents and reports that describe the damage mechanisms of ASME pressure equipment (vessels, pumps, valves, piping, and tanks, and their supports) in nuclear power plants. Thousands of pages published by EPRI, the NRC, ASME, NACE, research laboratories, utilities, contractors, and others, to […]
Clamp connections with metallic seals can offer superior joint integrity over traditional flanged connections but caution must be exercised regarding the service conditions, especially when cyclic thermal loading is present. This blog post highlights aspects of a clamp connection analysis performed by Becht Engineering. The client had observed significant loss of bolt preload at several […]
There are a variety of conditions an in-service component (e.g. vessel, tank, piping) can be found in. The purpose of Fitness-for-Service (FFS) is to evaluate the integrity of an in-service component given a certain degraded condition and rate it for future service considering potential for any additional degradation. A degraded condition does not have to […]
Contributing Authors: Eileen Chant, Greg Epremian, Ranjan Nadarajah, Mark Stonehouse Summarized herein are the substantial changes to API 579-1/ASME FFS-1, Fitness for Service, that were incorporated in the 2016 edition, as reviewed by Becht Fitness for Service experts. API 579-1/ASME FFS-1 is a Standard jointly published by API and ASME. The purpose of the document […]
Settlement of a pipe support foundation is usually not a big deal to assess. A local piping flexibility model will reveal if the settled support keeps the pipe bending stresses within the allowable codes and, if the bending stresses are unacceptable, modifying the support and monitor periodically for further settlement is normally a quite manageable […]
How long will the cyclone system in a Cat Cracker reactor or regenerator last? Cyclones systems in Fluidized Catalytic Cracker units (FCC) are typically designed to a creep allowable stress, where the stress field at various locations of the system has been determined by linear elastic analysis. The basic allowable stress for such internal structures […]
It is often unsettling to have an inspection group discover a crack-like flaw in a piece of pressure containing equipment, particularly when the turn-around schedule is aggressive. Fortunately, there are well-established Fitness-for-service procedures in place to assess such flaws and help guide decision-making on whether to repair or to leave in place with a monitoring […]
Process vessels such as towers, drums and heat exchangers may be exposed to low temperatures as a part of normal operation or as the result of an upset condition. Carbon and low alloy steels typically used in process vessels undergo a transition from ductile to brittle behavior as temperature is reduced and are at increased […]
While fracture mechanics is used in fitness-for-service, FFS, for evaluation of crack like flaws that are detected and for evaluation of the potential for brittle fracture, it is also used in new design to evaluate fatigue life. The rules for high pressure vessels in Section VIII, Div 3 and ASME B31.3 Chapter X permit and […]
The pressure vessel and piping jurisdiction in Alberta, Canada is ABSA – the pressure equipment safety authority. All pressure equipment as defined by the provincial Safety Codes Act must be registered with ABSA. I have been involved in registering piping systems and pressure vessels in this, my home jurisdiction. The focus of this blog […]
