Combined Effects of Tube

Projection, Initial Tube-Tubesheet

N. Merah
Department of Mechanical Engineering,
King Fahd University of Petroleum & Minerals,
Dhahran 31261, Saudi Arabia
e-mail: nesar@kfupm.edu.sa
A. Al-Aboodi
Buraydah College of Technology,
Buraidah, Al-Qassim 51432, Saudi Arabia
A. N. Shuaib
Y. Al-Nassar
Department of Mechanical Engineering,
King Fahd University of Petroleum & Minerals,
Dhahran 31261, Saudi Arabia
S. S. Al-Anizi
Department of Consulting Services,
Saudi Arabian Oil Company,
Dhahran 31311, Saudi Arabia
Clearance, and Tube Material
Strain Hardening on Rolled Joint
Strength
The tube-to-tubesheet joint strength is measured in terms of interfacial pressure between
the tube’s outer surface and tubesheet bore. The strength of a rolled joint is influenced by
several design parameters, including the type of tube and tubesheet materials, initial tube
projection, and the initial radial clearance between the tube and tubesheet, among other
factors. This paper uses finite element analysis (FEA) to evaluate the effect of several
parameters on the strength of rolled joints having large overtolerances, a situation that
applies to used equipment. An axisymmetric finite element model based on the sleeve
diameter and rigid tube expanding roller concepts was used to analyze the effects of tube
projection, initial tube-tubesheet clearance, and tube material strain-hardening property
on the deformation behavior of the rolled tube and on the strength of the tube-tubesheet
joint. The FEA results show that for zero tube projection (flush) the initial clearance
effect is dependent on the strain-hardening capability of the tube material. For low
strain-hardening tube material the interfacial pressure remains constant well above the
Tubular Exchanger Manufacturer’s Association maximum overtolerance. A drastic reduc-
tion in joint strength is observed at high values of radial clearances. The cut-off clear-
ance (clearance at which the interfacial pressure starts to drop) is found to vary linearly
with the tube material hardening level, and the contact stress increases slightly for
moderate strain-hardening tube materials but shows lower cut-off clearance levels. Fur-
thermore, with flush tubes the maximum contact pressure occurs close to the secondary
face (at the end of rolling) while for joints with initial tube projection the contact pressure
shows two maxima occurring near the primary and the secondary faces. This is attributed
to the presence of two elbows in tube deformation near the primary and secondary faces.
The average interfacial pressure increased with increasing projection length for all clear-
ances. Tube material strain hardening enhances the interfacial pressure in a similar
fashion for all initial tube projection lengths considered in the analysis.
关DOI: 10.1115/1.3142387兴

Keywords: tube-tubesheet, joint strength, projection, initial clearance, finite element

1 Introduction tion. A number of researchers have shown that the complexity of

During the rolling process the tube is projected from the pri-
mary face of the tubesheet for many reasons, among them is to
weld the edge of the tubesheet to the tube and to prevent the tube
from shortening inside the tubesheet during expansion. Tubular
Exchanger Manufacturer’s Association 共TEMA兲 关1兴 specifies in
RCB-7.513 that tubes shall be flush with or extend by no more
than one-half of a tube diameter beyond the face of each
tubesheet. Yokell 关2兴 suggested projecting the tube from the sec-
ondary face of the tubesheet rather than the front to eliminate a
potential source of corrosion and fatigue failure.
Simulation of rolling expansion process coupled with high level
of initial tube-tubesheet clearances and tube projection by the fi-
nite element 共FE兲 method is associated with a number of difficul-
ties such as roller kinematics and the absence of loading axisym-
metry. In fact, the mechanical rolling process is actually an
example of periodical symmetry with respect to the load applica-
Contributed by the Pressure Vessel and Piping Division of ASME for publication
in the JOURNAL OF PRESSURE VESSEL TECHNOLOGY. Manuscript received February 19,
2008; final manuscript received March 3, 2009; published online July 24, 2009.
Review conducted by Donald Mackenzie. Paper presented at the AMPT06, 2006.
the tube-to-tubesheet roller expansion can be simplified by reduc-
ing it to an axisymmetric quasistatic problem. Aufaure 关3兴 em-
ployed this approach in which the roller profile is used to intro-
duce a radial displacement to the inner surface of the tube.
Displacements are applied in steps up to required expansion then
the load is released such that the tube-to-tubesheet contact ensures
the strength of the connection joint after transmitting a large radial
stress to tube’s outer surface. Updike et al. 关4兴 showed that the
effect of the mechanical roller expansion process can be ad-
equately simulated with a two-dimensional axisymmetric math-
ematical model. Subsequently, other researchers 关5–10兴 have
adapted the use of axisymmetric FE model to simulate roller ex-
pansion. Furthermore, Williams 关5兴 showed that there was no ad-
ditional gain in accuracy of predicting the residual stresses
through the use of a three-dimensional finite element model.
Existing finite element analyses that deal with clearance effects
on joint strength have mainly addressed hydraulic expansion of
tubes into tubesheets. Allam et al. 关6,9兴 and Merah et al. 关7兴 used
FE to study the effect of initial clearance and material strain hard-
ening on contact stress for hydraulic tube-to-tubesheet expansion.
They found that the contact pressure decreases as the initial radial
clearance and tangent modulus increase. Al-Aboodi et al. 关8兴 stud-

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 Fig. 1 Schematic representation of tube-tubesheet joint with
initial tube projection

ied the effect of clearance, material strain hardening, and percent

wall reduction on rolled tube-tubesheet joint strength. They
showed that for each amount of percent wall reduction and type of
tube material there exists a critical clearance value below which
the joint strength is not affected. Their numerical results were
validated by the experimental results reported by Shuaib et al.
关10兴.
The present paper presents results on the combined effects of
high clearances, material strain hardening, and tube projection on
the deformation behavior of roller expanded tube and on the re-
sulting contact pressure. The study was performed using an axi- Fig. 2 FE model geometry and dimensions in millimeters
symmetric finite element model based on the sleeve diameter and
rigid roller concepts to simulate the rolled overexpanded joints.

2 Finite Element Model increments until contact of the tube with the tubesheet is estab-
lished. The targeted percent wall reduction in the tube wall thick-
Figure 1 shows a schematic representation of the tube-tubesheet ness is reached by performing 50 substeps in the second loading
joint considered in the present study. To include ligament effect on step. The third step simulates the retraction of the roller after
joint strength, the equivalent sleeve diameter has been used in this achieving the required tube wall thickness reduction. The ex-
study as suggested by a number of researchers 关5–10兴. The panded length of the tube, which is equal to the roller length
equivalent sleeve is a single hole model that will produce contact shown in Fig. 2, was 47.25 mm 共1.872 in.兲; this represents about
pressure, stress distribution, or deflection, depending on the ob- 75% of the tubesheet thickness. The total radial displacement of
jective of the study, around the hole that is equivalent to the av- the roller was obtained from the values of the required percent
erage of those around the test hole on the real tubesheet configu- wall reduction %WR, tube thickness t, and initial clearance c
ration. Since this study concerns the same basic configuration of using the following equation:
the stabilizer feed/bottom exchanger used in the work of Merah et
al. 关7兴 and Shuaib et al. 关10兴, the sleeve dimensions will remain
unchanged. The geometry and dimensions of the axisymmetric
model are illustrated in Fig. 2. The tube inner and outer radii are
7.425 mm and 9.525 mm, respectively, and the tubesheet bore’s
inner and outer radii are 9.525+ c mm and 36 mm, respectively,
where c is the radial clearance, which will be varied here from 0
mm to 0.5 mm to cover the range of clearance levels under inves-
tigation. It should be mentioned that for this tube dimension the
TEMA allowable radial clearance is about 0.16 mm. The initial
tube projection beyond the primary face is varied between 0 and
1/2 the tube diameter 共about 10 mm兲 to evaluate the effect of tube
projection.
The tube and tubesheet areas are meshed using the 2D quadratic
element defined by eight nodes having two degrees of freedom, as
shown in Fig. 3. Because of the expected large deflections due to
the large overtolerances 共clearances兲 used in this study the geo-
metric nonlinearities are included in the model. CONTA172 and
TARGE169 elements 关11兴 are used to represent the 2D contacting
and deformable surfaces, respectively. These elements have the
same geometric characteristics as the solid element face to which
they are connected. Contact occurs when the element
共CONTA172兲 surface penetrates one of the target segment ele-
ments 共TARGE169兲 on a specified target surface.
The tube and tubesheet were constrained from translation in the
axial direction on the primary side of the tubesheet. The exact
tube expanding roller profile is represented by a rigid body line in
Fig. 2. Loading during the rolling process is performed in three
steps. The first step displaces the roller radially outward in small Fig. 3 Meshed axisymmetric model

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 Fig. 4 Radial deformation profiles of the inner and outer surfaces of the tube expanded
in a joint with zero clearance
ur = 冉 %WRt
100
冊+c 共1兲
This radial displacement of the roller is used by industry during
roller expanding tube-to-tubesheet joints and the process is called
the interference fit method.
The tube and tubesheet material elastic-plastic behavior is rep-
resented by bilinear curves. Each of the tube and tubesheet mate-
rial has a yield stress of 248 MPa, an elastic modulus of 207 GPa,
and Poisson’s ratio of 0.3. These properties were specified for the
tube and tubesheet materials in the finite element analysis.
Because of expected large plastic strains, the bilinear isotropic
共BISO兲 hardening option was used in the model. The curve in the
plastic region was approximated by a linear relationship. The
slope of the approximated line 共or lines兲 in the plastic region of
the true stress-strain diagram defines the tangent modulus. An
elastic-perfectly-plastic material has a zero tangent modulus. The
approximate value of the tangential modulus of plasticity Ett for
the tube was 733 MPa. However, to investigate the effect of tube
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and tubesheet material strain hardening on contact stresses, Ett
values ranging from 0 GPa to 1.2 GPa are considered.
3 Effect of Clearance and Tube Projection on Tube
Deformation
To evaluate the effect of projection on the strength of the rolled
joint, tube projection values ranging between 0 mm and 10 mm
were used in the investigation. These tube projection values fall
within and beyond those specified by TEMA. The effect of vary-
ing the radial clearance values between 0 mm and 0.5 mm and the
effect of varying the tube material strain-hardening parameter,
represented by the tangent modulus Ett between 0 GPa and 1.2
GPa, were also studied. The combined effects of projection, tan-
gent modulus, and clearance on the tube deformation behavior and
the joint strength represented by the average contact stress are
discussed in the following.
Figure 4 shows the distributions of the residual radial displace-
ment of the inner and outer surfaces of the tube, after unloading
OCTOBER 2009, Vol. 131 / 051201-3
 Fig. 5 Radial deformation profiles of the inner and outer surfaces of the
tube expanded in a joint with 0.127 mm clearance
the expanding roller, along the expanded length of the tube that
has a tangential modulus of 800 MPa, which is a typical value of
Ett for steel tubes used in the stabilizer feed/bottom exchanger.
The residual radial deflection of the inner and outer surfaces of the
tube in Fig. 4共a兲 is for a joint with flush tube 共i.e., zero projection兲
and with zero tube-tubesheet clearance, whereas the residual ra-
dial deflection of the inner and outer surfaces of the tube in Fig.
4共b兲 is for a joint with a tube projection of 2 mm and with zero
initial tube-tubesheet clearance.
Figure 4共a兲 shows that for zero tube projection the deformation
of the inner tube surface remains quasiuniform at about 0.07 mm
from the primary face of the tube until the transition zone 共area
between expanded and unexpanded tubes on the secondary face
side of the tubesheet兲, where the inner surface deformation in-
creases rapidly to a peak value of 0.097 mm, before it drops
rapidly to 0.01 mm. The outer tube surface, however, exhibits a
quasiuniform deformation of about 0.055 mm along the deformed
length of the tube until the transition zone where the deformation
decays toward zero hence after; the outer surface does not show
an abrupt change in geometry like the inner surface. The differ-
ence in deformation between the inner and outer surfaces of the
expanded tube is what creates the residual radial 共contact兲 stress at
the interface between the tube and tubesheet. For the case of 2
mm tube projection and zero initial clearance, the inner tube sur-
face radial deformation profile in Fig. 4共b兲 shows two humps; a
small one at the primary face, due to the presence of a projected
length of the tube, and a large one in the transition zone. The
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deformation profile of the outer tube surface inside the tubesheet
is similar to that of joint with zero projection shown in Fig. 4共a兲.
Figure 5共a兲 shows the radial deformation profiles of the inner
and outer surfaces of the tube for a joint with flush tube and a
typical TEMA clearance of 0.127 mm. It is noticed that, although
the radial deformation of the tube is higher for the joint with 0.02
mm clearance compared with that with zero initial tube-tubesheet
clearance, the shape of the deformation profile is similar to that of
the zero initial tube-tubesheet clearance. Figure 5共b兲 shows that
when the initial clearance is increased to 0.127 mm, the size of the
hump near the primary surface is insignificant even for an initial
tube projection of 4 mm. The presence of the initial clearance may
have reduced the constraint on the outer tube wall and has thus
reduced the effect of projection.
4 Combined Effects of Tube Projection, Initial Clear-
ance, and Strain Hardening on Joint Strength
The effects of initial clearance and tube material strain harden-
ing on the contact pressure for the case of a joint with a flush tube
are depicted in Fig. 6. For elastic-perfectly-plastic material 共Ett
= 0 GPa兲, the increase in clearance produces a slight decrease in
contact stress until the clearance reaches a critical value of 0.34
mm 共about twice TEMA clearance limit, represented by the dotted
line in the figure兲. The contact stress experiences a sudden drop
after the critical clearance value. On the other hand, for strain-
hardening materials, the contact stress increases with the increase
Transactions of the ASME
 Fig. 6 Contact stress versus clearance for flush tube and dif-
ferent Ett with WR= 5%
in radial clearance. As explained by Al-Aboodi et al. 关8兴 the in-
crease in interfacial stress is attributed to tube material strain hard-
ening resisting tubesheet material spring back. The sudden drop is
due to insufficient wall reduction as has been demonstrated in
earlier work by the same researchers 关8兴.
The value of the cut-off 共critical兲 clearance at which the joint
strength experiences a sudden drop has been found to be inversely
proportional to Ett 关8兴. The relationship between critical clearance
and tangent modulus can be expressed by the following empirical
relation:
ccr = − 0.05Ett + 0.34 共2兲
The contact stress corresponding to the cut-off clearance is also
linearly related to Ett:
␴cr = 9.766Ett + 53.633 共3兲
The increase in contact stress with the increase in Ett is attributed
to the tube material strain hardening resisting tubesheet material
spring back. Smaller cut-off clearances at higher Ett are due to
large strain difference upon spring back of strain-hardening tube
material.
The contact pressure distribution profile shown in Fig. 7 fol-
lows a pattern similar to that of the tube surface deflection profiles
in Figs. 4 and 5, with that of the joint with a tube projection case
Fig. 7 Contact stress „in pascals… distributions for flush tube and tube initial projection
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Fig. 8 Combined effects of tube material strain hardening, Ett,
and the length of tube projection for a joint with a clearance of
0.127 mm and 5% tube wall reduction
having two maxima peaks 共Fig. 7共b兲兲, which are located near the
primary face and in the transition zone, resulting in higher average
interfacial pressure.
The combined effects of tube material strain hardening and tube
projection length for a radial clearance of 0.127 mm and 5% WR
are illustrated in Fig. 8. These results show that the tube projection
length has a similar effect on the contact pressure for all Ett values
considered in this study. Again higher tube strain hardening results
in stronger joint for all investigated values of tube projection. The
figure shows that this strength is not affected by tube projection
lengths higher than 3.5 mm 共about the 1/8 in. value prescribed by
TEMA for the joint geometry under investigation兲. The contact
stress increased with tube projection length and reached a maxi-
mum value at a projection length of approximately 1/4 of the tube
diameter for all investigated levels of Ett and clearance. This in-
crease in interfacial pressure is caused by the hump of the contact
stress profile arising from the additional transition zone near the
primary face of the joint; this produced higher average contact
stresses.
The combined effects of radial clearance and tube projection on
residual contact stress of the joint under investigation can be de-
duced from Fig. 9 where the tube having Ett = 0.8 GPa has been
subjected to 5% wall reduction during roller expansion. For the
OCTOBER 2009, Vol. 131 / 051201-5

Fig. 9 Combined effects of clearance and tube projection
length for a plastic tangent modulus of 0.8 GPa and 5% WR
levels of radial clearance shown in the figure, the contact stress
shows gradual increase within the initial tube projection range of
0 mm and 3.5 mm and then stays at the same level beyond the 3.5
mm projection level. Figure 9 also shows that contact stress ver-
sus projection curves are crowded together in the 0.1–0.3 mm
clearance range. However, for 0.4 mm clearance the contact stress
for a flush tube falls from an average of 61 MPa, which corre-
sponds to the 0.1–0.3 mm clearance range, to 42 MPa. This is
because this clearance level exceeds the critical value for the 5%
wall reduction.
5 Conclusion
An axisymmetric finite element model based on the sleeve di-
ameter and rigid tube expanding roller concepts was used to ana-
lyze the effects of tube projection, initial tube-tubesheet clearance,
and tube material strain-hardening property on the deformation
behavior of the rolled tube and on the strength of the tube-
tubesheet joint. The results showed that the presence of initial tube
projection introduced a second transition zone at the primary face.
This transition zone is less important at larger clearances. This has
resulted in enhancing the average contact stress between the tube
and tubesheet. The enhancement of joint strength is limited to a
projection length of 1/4 of the tube diameter. Higher tube strain-
hardening material resulted in higher contact stress for all projec-
tion lengths. The effect of tube projection is independent of initial
clearance below the critical clearance value.
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Acknowledgment
The authors thankfully acknowledge the support of the King
Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals 共KFUPM兲 and Saudi
Arabian Oil Company. The support of Buraydah College of Tech-
nology provided to A. A. Al-Aboodi. is also acknowledged.
Nomenclature
c ⫽ initial radial clearance between tube and
tubesheet
ccr ⫽ critical clearance
E ⫽ modulus of elasticity
Ett ⫽ tube material tangent modulus
t ⫽ tube thickness
ur ⫽ radial displacement
WR ⫽ tube thickness wall reduction percentage
␴cr ⫽ contact stress corresponding to critical
clearance
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Transactions of the ASME