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Alignment Check Methodology in Piping Stress Analysis Using Caesar II

Alignment between piping flanges and equipment flanges is important to avoid vibration and failures during operation. American Petroleum Institute code API RP 686 provides limits for acceptable misalignment of less than 1.5 mm vertically and horizontally, and less than 0.0573 degrees of parallelism. In Caesar II, alignment can be checked by making the equipment nozzle flexible, adjusting spring supports, running load cases with and without springs, and checking that displacements are within the specified limits. If not, spring and support adjustments are made and reanalyzed until alignment criteria are satisfied.

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Erden Baldži
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1K views2 pages

Alignment Check Methodology in Piping Stress Analysis Using Caesar II

Alignment between piping flanges and equipment flanges is important to avoid vibration and failures during operation. American Petroleum Institute code API RP 686 provides limits for acceptable misalignment of less than 1.5 mm vertically and horizontally, and less than 0.0573 degrees of parallelism. In Caesar II, alignment can be checked by making the equipment nozzle flexible, adjusting spring supports, running load cases with and without springs, and checking that displacements are within the specified limits. If not, spring and support adjustments are made and reanalyzed until alignment criteria are satisfied.

Uploaded by

Erden Baldži
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Alignment Check Methodology in Piping

Stress Analysis using Caesar II


Alignment Checking this term is quite familiar with piping engineers and all construction engineers.
During piping installation at construction site it is expected that equipment flange should match perfectly
(aligned) with the piping flange so that during bolting no problem occurs. But achieving that perfect
alignment is very difficult to achieve. If this alignment for rotary equipments are not proper then there
may be several problems in future during operation which may lead to vibration of equipment/piping
system or in some situation equipment failure. American Petroleum Institute code API RP 686provides
the data for acceptable deviation from the ideal perfect alignment. As per the code if the vertical and
horizontal deviation of piping flange and rotary equipment flange center line is within 1.5 mm and
parallelism (rotation) is within 0.0573 degree then the alignment is accepted otherwise means to be
devised to bring the deviation within those values. While performing stress analysis of rotary equipment
connected piping systems in Caesar II we can very easily ensure this limitation. The following write up will
describe the step by step method of doing the same.

Alignment check of nozzle flange shall be performed for all Rotating Equipments like Centrifugal
Compressor, Steam Turbine, Centrifugal Pumps, Gear Pumps etc as per following procedure.
Steps for performing Alignment checking:

Ensure correct weight of the pipe (with proper thickness), Support weight (dummy pipe), Weight of valves,
flanges and any in-line items.

Consider Insulation density carefully (equivalent insulation density to be correctly fed with insulation &
cladding weight, Check insulation on dummies for cold insulated lines).

Model all branch piping (like drip legs etc.) greater than 2 inches.

Discuss with piping lead engineer for requirement of any maintenance flanges (Normally for steam turbine or
centrifugal connected lines the maintenance flange is recommended) and include it if required.

Minimize the sustained load on equipment nozzle as much as possible during static analysis run of the Caesar
model.

Normal industry practice is to analyse the Alignment checking in separate file. So rename the static file
as Filename_Alignment.C2

Make the equipment nozzle anchor flexible or remove the displacement if anchor was not modeled.

Wherever spring support is used, define spring rate and cold load in case of variable effort spring & Constant
effort support load in case of constant effort spring.

After performing the above create one additional load case in Caesar II as mentioned below:
WNC+H

SUS

System with spring hanger

WNC

SUS

System without spring hanger

Set the spring hanger as As designed.(Two load cases can be generated for spring As designed and rigid
condition)

Now run the analysis and check the displacements of the nozzle at the above mentioned load case and limit them
within below mentioned values:
Vertical deflection (Normally DY):

+/- 1.5 mm

Horizontal displacement (sqrt sum of DX and DZ):

+/- 1.5 mm

Parallelism (sqrt sum of RX and RZ) :

0.0573 degree.

In case the above limitations are not met then re-analyse by readjusting the spring and other supports and do the
simulation.

Alignment check is to be performed for both inlet and outlet lines.

Alignment check must be performed with spring under both in As designed and in locked condition.

To avoid small misalignment in vertical direction first support from rotary equipment nozzle is used either a
spring support or an adjustable type support.

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