Algorithmic formulation of clay and sand pipe–soil interaction models for on-bottom stability analysis

This paper presents a new algorithmic formulation of the clay and sand pipe–soil interaction models recommended by the DNV-RP-F109 code for dynamic on-bottom stability analysis of submarine pipelines. The pipe–soil force update algorithm is formulated within the framework of computational elasto-plasticity and applies Backward-Euler integration to ensure stability and robustness for large time step sizes. Algorithmic optimization techniques are developed by utilizing a closed-form solution and subincrementation. A numerical verification study covering full cyclic displacement ranges of a 12 inch pipeline is presented. The new formulation is shown to increase the time step size by a factor of up to 50 compared to commercial software tools for on-bottom stability analysis. This achievement will be particularly beneficial for long-duration 3D nonlinear time domain on-bottom stability analysis.