Design of bend restrictor for flexible pipes

During applications, composite offshore flexible pipes may subject to over-bending. Bend restrictor is designed to prevent such over-bending. All possible loading conditions shall be considered during design of bend restrictor. In addition, each bend restrictor shall be designed individually to satisfy specific requirements of offshore flexible pipes under different environmental loads. To design optimal bend restrictors, researches are conducted for characteristics and selection of materials, structural design, regional and overall computation & analysis, fabrication processes and testing procedures in accordance with features of functional loads and environmental loads on composite offshore flexible pipes and according to relevant codes and standards. In addition, computational analysis is conducted for bend restrictor by using development software, computation formula and finite-element analysis software. The research results have significant values for design and fabrication of composite offshore flexible pipes in China.