PT&P/U.S. Bellows: Expansion Joint Catalog: Types and Designs

TYPES AND DESIGN STYLES

PT&P offers all of the types of metal expansion joints. Each type has advantages and limitations, which when applied correctly, can provide the flexibility, load reduction, structural integrity and reliability desired in a piping system.

Expansion joints, besides acting as sections of a pipe, capable of withstanding the design temperatures, pressures, and media, also provide the flexibility that makes them necessary. That flexibility can be either axial, lateral or angular. However, in many installations, some rigidity or structural strength is needed to support piping loads or to control the motion of the bellows and the pipe. Features are then added to the expansion joint to limit the modes or degrees of freedom, or the types of deflections, and to resist shear, or tension, or compression loads and/or bending moments. The most common types are presented in this catalog. This section describes how they work, in what ways they are flexible, and what piping applied loads and moments they can accept. The section entitled Applications contains discussions and examples of how various types of expansion joints can be used to solve piping expansion problems.