Wouldn’t that make impossible for “pigs” to go trough resist flow, make cavitation acumulate grime and other piping problems?
Surely they have a reason to be but I have no idea what it is
In: Engineering
As somebody that has worked in the design and construction for the Oil and Gas industry in Canada for years, I can say that /u/old_liberal is correct. These are for thermal expansion. You may understand that some items increase or decrease in size as the temperature changes.
This also happens with steel, and is captured with ‘bends’ or larger elbows (usually 3x or 5x the diameter of the pipe). This will permit the ‘pigs’ to still pass through the pipeline to either clean or inspect (most inspection pigs would require a minimum 5D bend (5x diameter of pipe).
Let me know if you have other questions, as I no longer work in O&G but I still enjoy the design of the systems.
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