Friends,

I have fixed tubesheet exchanger design. The tubesheets are integral with shell. While running the calculation without expansion bellow, the stress values are higher. Hence, I decided to use thick expansion bellow design. PVElite asks for Spring rate, Inside diameter of expansion bellow and outside diamter of expansion bellow. Could you please explain how I can decide these values.

Thanks in advance..

Kumar

Dear Kumar,

There are 2 options for the expansion joint in PV Elite,

if you select "Analyze" and enter the geometry of the expansion joint then the joint will be analyzed. Hence the spring rate and stresses in the joint will be computed.

if you select "Existing" then the program will ask for the spring rate and will not compute the stresses in the joint. This option is useful when you are not analyzing the expansion joint. This may be the case if you are purchasing the expansion joint from another company.

So, if you do not have the expansion joint then select "Analyze" and the program will compute the spring rate.