Spacing issue for vertical large-diameter pipeline guides
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I would like to ask which expert has guidelines regarding the recommended spacing for guide frames in large-diameter vertical pipes? \"Piping Installation Design for Petrochemical Industries\" provides recommended values only for pipes up to DN600. The top vapor line of our company’s propylene distillation tower is 36\" in diameter, with the spacing between the guide frames being around 30 meters. Vibration has been detected, and we are not sure whether this is caused by an excessive spacing between the guide frames.
Then add a set of guides in the middle :)
Adding supports to the tower is not an easy task; that’s why I wanted to confirm whether it was caused by an excessive distance between the guide frames.
It is quite large; for the LNG pipelines we manufacture, for 32\" pipes vertical installations usually require a guide support every around 10 meters, and 30 meters is indeed too much.
Just based on experience? Are there any standards or values or something like that?
At present, it relies mostly on experience, as calculating the axial spacing based on axial instability would yield very large values for large pipes. If wind loads and the resonance generated within the fluid are taken into account. It’s again rather complicated and impossible to predict accurately.
As a supplementary note, the maximum seismic acceleration on Earth is approximately 0.4g; thus, the pipes can be considered to be under a gravitational load of up to 0.4 times their own weight acting in their interior, though this is certainly an occasional and non-sustained condition. Therefore, guide frames can generally also be considered in terms of 2 to 3 basic spans. The same is true for horizontal pipes.