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Something that have always been bothering me is working with instrumentation tubing. How safe is it? I have seen tubing snapped before due to constant vibration on a medium pressure application only. So looking at a application on a pressure vessel running at 100 to 150 Bar which was built with 2 inch wall thickness and 1500lb flanges to contain this 150Bar product (condensate and hydrocarbon gas), surely using this ½ inch S/S tubing to connect to a level DP transmitter is the weakest point of the whole vessel. It defeats the object of having this big thick wall pressure vessel. Some say no, since the diameter of the tubing makes it safe and that the force per square inch inside the vessel is much more than inside the tubing therefore the thick walls are needed on the vessel. I don’t see that, surely 150 Bar is the same all over so the forces and pressure inside the vessel and tubing must be the same. Up to what pressure is it safe to use ½ inch S/S tubing? Vibration is present in most applications due to product flow so this must also reduce the max application limit.
I have brought this safety issue up with our design engineers before and they said that this is done, and the tubing is used all over the world and that it is safe, so basically shut up and leave it alone, this is the world standard so who are you to question it?
I know you can get Monel tubing as well and that will most probably safer to use but this is about normal thin and thick wall 316 S/S instrumentation tubing so let’s leave Monel out of it for now.
Some of your thoughts, opinions and technical knowledge on this issue would be appreciated.
I have brought this safety issue up with our design engineers before and they said that this is done, and the tubing is used all over the world and that it is safe, so basically shut up and leave it alone, this is the world standard so who are you to question it?
I know you can get Monel tubing as well and that will most probably safer to use but this is about normal thin and thick wall 316 S/S instrumentation tubing so let’s leave Monel out of it for now.
Some of your thoughts, opinions and technical knowledge on this issue would be appreciated.