Failure Analysis of Heat Exchanger Tubes in The Indirect Air-cooled Rotary Shell

In this paper, a bundle of 6 tubes of DIN 1.4878 with each 20300 mm length, 511 mm diameter and 5 mm thickness operates under thermal and rotary bending stress with fixed support at one-end and simply supported (fix and adjustable) at the various point are examined. Newly installed tubes failed before 1 year in operation compared to 13 years from the previous one. Failure mood identified; severe metal loss and cracks at the outer tubes surface in contact with the supports and connection bolts snapped. Author’s main objective is to examine the tubes and try to indentify the problems and suggestion to overcome the tube failure.

Keywords: Shell and tube heat exchanger, thermal stress, rotary bending, tube failure.

M.M.Noor