TY - JOUR
AU - Sotoodeh, Karan
AB - Subsea valves and actuators are typically installed at very deep-water depths between 1 and 3 km. The seawater column at such depths applies a high amount of pressure on subsea valves and actuators. Therefore, one way to make sure that subsea equipment and components can withstand the tremendous external pressure of the seawater is to make the component wall thick enough, as is the practice for subsea valves. Subsea actuators, unlike valves, are not designed thick enough since actuators shells are not pressurized by internal fluid. The alternative solution to prevent the implosion and failure of actuators due to seawater pressure head, and to avoid increasing material cost by increasing wall thickness, is to use a pressure balance compensation system. The main research question is twofold: how to select between the available compensation systems in the industrial world and how to implement conceptual design for the selected compensation system. The research does not include a detailed design of the compensation system. The spring type pressure compensation system is reviewed in this paper and is not recommended due to the possibility of spring damage due to high cycling load. Installing the pressure compensation on the surface and connecting the compensation oil fluid to the subsea equipment through piping or tubing is more costly, less efficient and heavier compared to a bladder type compensation system. Bladder type compensation, also known as closed compensation, is widely used for subsea actuators as an environmentally friendly solution. This paper proposes a conceptual design for this type of compensation system that includes a wall thickness calculation according to American Society of Mechanical Engineers Sec. VIII Div. 02 requirements, as well as pressure relief valves installed on the compensation system according to American Petroleum Institute (API) 526 requirements.
TI - Conceptual design and selection of a bladder type pressure compensation system for subsea actuators to prevent failure due to seawater head
JF - International Journal on Interactive Design and Manufacturing
DO - 10.1007/s12008-021-00766-0
DA - 2021-12-01
UR - https://www.deepdyve.com/lp/springer-journals/conceptual-design-and-selection-of-a-bladder-type-pressure-qZgV7SeBVS
SP - 673
EP - 680
VL - 15
IS - 4
DP - DeepDyve
ER -