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Thin-Walled Structures 44 (2006) 726729

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Stability loss of thin-walled cylindrical tubes, subjected to

longitudinal compressive forces and external corrosion
R.M. Bergmana,, S.P. Levitskya, J. Haddada, E.M. Gutmanb
a

Sami Shamoon College of Engineering, Bialik/Bazel St., P.O. Box 45, Beer-Sheva 84100, Israel
Department of Materials Engineering, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, P.O. Box 653, Beer-Sheva 84105, Israel

Received 21 July 2005; received in revised form 28 July 2006; accepted 1 August 2006
Available online 26 September 2006

Abstract
The paper is devoted to investigation of stability loss of thin-walled elastic circular cylindrical pipes subjected to simultaneous action of
longitudinal compressive forces and uniform corrosion from outside. The pipe is treated as a thin closed elastic circular cylindrical shell
which can be described within KirchhoffLove approximation. The critical time of stability loss of the pipe is found, using the upper
critical load value for static stability loss of the pipe, not subjected to corrosion, and the law of corrosion rate. Numerical results were
obtained for pipes, made from steel and aluminum with different initial wall thickness.
r 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Cylindrical shell; Longitudinal forces; Stability loss; Corrosion; Life-time

1. Introduction
Thin-walled circular cylindrical tubes are widely used in
aircraft industry (for example, as airplanes body) and
during the ight of the plane are subjected to simultaneous
action of longitudinal compressive forces and hidden
corrosion. Another important example of longitudinally
forced tubes can be found in civil engineeringthe pillars
of different buildings are made usually from thin-walled
circular tubes. Such pipes are often subjected to external
uniform corrosion. In certain cases of practical importance
the pipe stability loss can occur before the breaking stresses
are reached. As a result the lifetime of pipes in these
conditions will be completely governed by the criterion of
stability loss. Numerous investigations have been devoted
to stability loss analysis of elastic thin-walled cylindrical
tubes, subjected to various loads, particularly, to longitudinal compressive forces, e.g. [1]. However, these
investigations do not take into account the fact that in
the process of structure operation these pipes can be
subjected to the action of corrosion, which changes the
tube thickness.
Corresponding author. Tel.: +972 8 6475656; fax: +972 8 6475654.

E-mail address: rudolf@sce.ac.il (R.M. Bergman).

0263-8231/$ - see front matter r 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.tws.2006.08.006

In the paper [2], the effect of uniform internal corrosion

on stability loss of thin-walled circular cylindrical tube,
subjected to action of uniform external pressure, was
investigated. It was shown that the structure life time of the
tube in these conditions is completely dened by criterion
of stability loss of elastic pipe, not subjected to corrosion
and by the law of corrosion rate, suggested in [3]. In the
paper [4] the method, developed in [2], was generalized for
the case of elastic thin-walled non-circular tube with a
variable wall thickness along the directrix, subjected to
permanent external pressure and non-homogeneous corrosion from inside.
In the present paper the method, developed in [2,4], is
used for determination of the critical time of stability loss
of elastic circular cylindrical pipe of a moderate length,
subjected to simultaneous action of permanent longitudinal
compressive forces and external corrosion.

2. Problem description
Corrosion is considered below as a process of uniform
dissolution of the external surface of the tube, resulting
in decrease of the wall thickness h with time t. The rate
of this decrease is equal to the rate of corrosion.

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R.M. Bergman et al. / Thin-Walled Structures 44 (2006) 726729

Experimental data for various metals and steels, received

for pure elastic-stressed state, have shown that corrosion
rate depends essentially from the stressed state of the
material [3], which in our case is characterized by
longitudinal compressive stress s. It is changed with time
due to wall thickness decrease. As a result, the corrosion
rate v follows the relation v f st
. It was shown in [3]
that the exponent function gives good approximation for
this dependency. Similarly to [2,4], it is possible to write
the general corrosion law in an explicit form, taking into
account the specic conditions of corrosion and using
experimentally established parameters in the relation
v f st
.
The stability of thin-walled elastic circular cylindrical
pipe of a moderate length, subjected to the action of
longitudinal compressive forces from the butt ends and
uniform corrosion from the outside, is studied below within
KirchhoffLove approximation. The formulas for determining of the critical time, corresponding to the moment of
stability loss, will be obtained.
3. Determination of the shell thickness, corresponding to
stability loss at the given longitudinal compressive forces, in
the absence of corrosion
Let us consider in linear approximation the problem
of stability loss for a closed elastic circular cylindrical
shell of a moderate length L with wall thickness h(t)
and the radius of the middle surface R(t), subjected to
uniform-distributed compressive longitudinal forces with
intensity N (Fig. 1). It is supposed that the butt ends
are simply supported. Assuming that changes of the
wall thickness h(t) and, consequently, of the radius R(t)
are quasi-static, the equations of static stability loss can
be applied. It is suggested that the initial stress state of
the shell is membrane-like. Then the governing equation
for stability loss of a moderate length shell (LR)
within KirchhoffLove approximation can be written in

727

the form (see, e.g. [57])


Eh2
E q4 w N 4 q2 w
8
r w 2 4 r
0.
h
qx2
121  n2
R qx

(1)

It was taken into account here that in the neutral stress

state only longitudinal compressive stress s N=h is
present, so that effect of longitudinal compressive distributed forces is equivalent to that one from longitudinal
compressive stresses px N=h. In Eq. (1) E is Young
modulus, v is Poisson coefcient, x and y are axial and
circumferential coordinates of the shells middle surface,
respectively, and w is the normal deection of the shells
middle surface. Differential operators r4 and r8 are
dened by the following expressions:
r4

q2
q2
2
2
qx
qy

2
f;

r8 f

q2
q2
2
2
qx
qy

4
f,

(2)

where f f(x, y) is a function having the partial derivatives

of a corresponding order.
Boundary conditions for simply supported butt ends
have the form [57]
w

q2 w
0x 0; x L.
qx2

(3)

Note that the boundary conditions for longitudinal

displacement u and twisting displacement v of the shell are
not used here because the inequality maxfjuj; jvjgoojwj
takes place in each point of the shells middle surface in the
case under consideration (see, e.g., [7]).
The boundary conditions (3) are satised automatically
if solution of Eq. (1) is searched in the form [6]
w c sin

mpx
ny
sin ,
L
R

(4)

where m is the number of half-waves along the generatrix

of the cylinder, n the number of full waves along the
circumference and c is arbitrary constant. Substituting
Eq. (4) into Eq. (1) we obtain

2 2
4
Eh2
m p
n2
E m4 p 4

121  n2 L2
R2 L4
R2

2 2

2
N m p
n2 m2 p2


0.
5
h
L2
R2
L2
Let introduce non-dimensional parameters according to
the relations
_

NR
mpR
n2 h
;
Z

.
;
y

nL
R
Eh2

(6)

Then it follows from Eq. (5)

_

Fig. 1. Cylindrical coordinate system and scheme of the shell loading.

1
1 y2 2
y2
.
Z

121  n2
y2
1 y2 2 Z

(7)

Assuming that the numbers m and n are sufciently

large, we can nd the minimum of the non-dimensional

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R.M. Bergman et al. / Thin-Walled Structures 44 (2006) 726729

728
_

loading parameter p from the condition [6]

_

qp
0,
qr

(8)

where
1 y2 2
Z.
y2
We receive
p
rmin 121  n2

(9)

(10)
_

and for upper critical value p of the parameter p it follows:

1
_
p p .
31  n2

(11)

N 
Eh
p .
h
R 31  n2

Here v0 is the corrosion rate for a non-stressed pipe, V

the molar volume of the material, R0 the universal gas
constant, T the absolute temperature. Similarly to [2], from
Eqs. (14) and (16) the critical time t*, corresponding to the,
moment of the shell stability loss, can be obtained
Z s
t h0 s0 =v0
s2 expV s=R0 T
ds,
(17)
s0

The corresponding upper critical stress s* is dened by

the formula
s

For the function f(s) we use, similar to [2,4], the

following relation, grounded theoretically and experimentally in [3]



Vs
.
(16)
f s v0 exp
R0 T

(12)

Note that the result, given above, does not describe

uniquely the form of the deformed shell; it prescribes only
that parameter r satises the relation (10). It can be shown
[6,7] that if the shape of the shell after loss of stability is
assumed to be axisymmetrical, then for the upper critical
stress s* we receive Eq. (12).
The Eq. (12) was obtained with the assumption that the
shells wall thickness is specied, whereas the critical value
of the intensity of the distributed longitudinal forces N is
the unknown quantity. It follows from Eq. (12) that if we
assume, on the contrary, that the value of the intensity of
the longitudinal forces N is specied, then the shells wall
thickness h*, corresponding to stability loss, will be equal
to
p!1=2
NR 31  n2

h
.
(13)
E

where
h0 hjt0 ; s

Eh0
N
p ; s0 .
2
h
0
R 31  n

(18)

Note that in Eqs. (17) and (18) it is assumed that the

intensity of longitudinal forces N for a given initial wall
thickness h0 and pipe material satises the inequality
s0 ps .

(19)

If we introduce the dimensionless variables

T  t v0 =h0 ; t s=s ; N  s0 =s ,
then Eq. (17) takes the form
Z 1
dt
N  expV ts =R0 T
2 .
T
t
N

(20)

(21)

Here, similarly to [2,4], the value of T* can be treated as

a relative durability of the shell and the value of N* as a
safety coefcient for the stability. Note that Eq. (21)
coincides with Eq. (24) from [4].

4. Determination of the critical time for stability loss of the

shell, subjected to simultaneous action of permanent
longitudinal distributed compressive forces and uniform
external corrosion
It is assumed now that the shell is subjected to
simultaneous action of permanent longitudinal distributed
forces with intensity N and external uniform corrosion.
The rate of the shell thickness decrease at each moment of
time t is equal to general corrosion rate
dh
f s,
(14)
dt
where f(s) is sufciently smooth function of longitudinal
compressive stress
s  px

N
.
h

(15)

Fig. 2. Dependency of the relative durability T* on the safety coefcient

for stability N* for steel and aluminum tubes.

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R.M. Bergman et al. / Thin-Walled Structures 44 (2006) 726729

729

corrosion [2]. The graphs show that the relative durability

decreases with increase of the safety coefcient for stability;
for every value of parameter N* the corresponding value
T* for steel is higher than for aluminum; the rate of
decrease of the relative durability with the safety coefcient
for stability is larger for thicker shells.

6. Conclusion

Fig. 3. Dependency of the relative durability T* on the safety coefcient

for stability N* for steel tubes with different initial wall thickness.

5. Numerical results
Numerical simulations were performed on the basis of the
formula (21) in order to study the dependency of relative
durability T* on the safety coefcient for stability N* for
thin-walled pipes, considered above. The results are shown
in Figs. 2 and 3. In Fig. 2 the curves are presented for steel
and aluminum tubes with the following parameter values:
E 2  1011 N=m2 ; n 0:3; V 7  106 m3 =mol (steel)
and E 7  1010 N=m2 ; n 0:34; V 3  105 m3 =mol
(aluminum). It was adopted h0 =R 0:01; L=R 1,
T 27 C; R0 8:317 N m=mol grad.
In Fig. 3, the curves are presented for steel-made tubes
with different values of the relative wall thickness h0 =R (the
values of L=R; T; R0 are the same as for the data in Fig. 2).
It follows from Figs. 2 and 3 that the form of the curves
is similar to that one, characteristic for the problem of
stability loss of the tube, subjected to simultaneous action
of external permanent pressure and internal uniform

The critical time of stability loss of thin-walled elastic

circular cylindrical pipes of a moderate length, subjected to
uniform external corrosion and permanent distributed
longitudinal compressive forces, can be predicted from
the solution of the corresponding problem of static stability
for the same tube, accounting for the tubes wall thickness
uniform changes due to corrosion, accelerated by mechanical stresses in the metal. The analytic dependence for the
relative durability of the tube on the safety coefcient for
stability is found. The resulting relation was studied
numerically for different wall materials and initial wall
thickness.

References
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