Thin-walled thermoplastic pipes

Stressed skin and rib-reinforced shell structures optimize plastics pipe performance. Computation of engineered pipes is easy as they can be substituted for by orthotropic pipes having the same rigidity characteristics. The flexible pipe theory lends itself very well to the concept of thin walled plastics pipes predicting a 100-year design life. Practical experiences are studied as well as other dimensioning aspects, e.g. buckling, impact resistance and minimum wall thickness. Combinations of various construction principles and materials have different performance characteristics making market segmentation optimal.