Abstract
Three dimensional, elastic-plastic finite element(FE) analyses for circumferential through-wall cracked pipes under combined tension and bending are performed using actual tensile data of stainless steel, for two purposes. The first one is to validate the recently-proposed enhanced reference stress (ERS) method to estimate the J-integral and COD for circumferential through-wall cracked pipes under combined tension and bending. The second one is to compare those results with the GE/EPRI estimations. The FE results of the J-integral and the COD, resulting from six cases of proportional and non-proportional combined tension and bending, compare very well with those estimated from the proposed method. Excellent agreements of the proposed method with the detailed FE results provide sufficient confidence in the use of the proposed method to the Leak-Before-Break(LBB) analysis of through-wall cracked pipes under combined tension and bending.