Simplified mechanical model for evaluating stress in pipeline subject to settlement

Abstract Pipe deflection indicators are placed at appropriate intervals along critical underground pipelines, which are susceptible to ground settlement. Based on these deformations of the pipeline, three formulae are developed for estimating the stress in the pipeline. Thus, the stresses in: (i) buried portions; (ii) exposed portions of a pipeline; and (iii) the interface between buried and exposed portions are calculated. The formulae enable the stresses experienced at all portions of a pipeline, and are simplified assuming an elastic beam on an elastic foundation. Experimental data on pipeline settlement are applied to the derived formulae and the results are compared with those of FEM analysis. The effectiveness of the formulae is verified as identifying high stress locations readily from even extremely large sets of settlement data.