Diagnosing of Pipeline Supports Instability Using Acoustic Noise: Laboratory Experiment

The physical modeling results demonstrate the ability to diagnose instability of above-ground pipeline supports using acoustic noise recorded on the pipe surface. It is shown that developed in recent years method of extraction coherent components of noise field allows to determine frequencies and geometric shapes of flexural standing waves in pipelines. This information can be used to estimate the stability of pipeline supports. Support instability increasing the span between rigid pipe attachments manifests itself in a dramatic restructuring of the standing waves field formed in the pipe by acoustic noise.