Submarine pipeline reel pipe type laying GUI plug-in automatic modeling method

Abstract

The invention relates to a submarine pipeline reel pipe type laying GUI plug-in automatic modeling method. The method comprises the following steps: 1) establishing a GUI plug-in; 2) inputting module parameters into the GUI plug-in; and 3) calculating output, and completing modeling. According to the method, the PYTHON language and the GUI plug-in are combined, automatic rapid modeling of the reel pipe type laying process of the submarine pipeline is achieved, only about 10 seconds are needed for automatic modeling of each model, and the modeling speed is greatly increased.

Description

Technical Field

[0001] The invention belongs to the field of engineering technology, and in particular relates to a GUI plug-in automatic modeling method for submarine pipeline reel-type laying. Background Art

[0002] The construction of submarine pipelines is the lifeline of marine oil and gas production and plays a very important role in the process of oil and gas development. There are three main methods for laying marine oil and gas pipelines: S-laying (S-Lay), J-laying (J-Lay), and reel-laying (R-Lay). In order to avoid large plastic deformation of the pipeline during the laying process, S-laying is generally only applicable to shallow waters; while J-laying, which is suitable for deep-sea pipeline laying, has low efficiency and high costs.

[0003] Since the reel-to-rope laying was proposed in the mid-20th century, it has developed rapidly in the late 20th century. The general process of reel-to-rope laying is as follows: the pipe sections are welded into several thousand meters long pipelines on land, and then they are wound on the drum of the reel-to-rope ship; the reel-to-rope ship sails to the predetermined location, the pipeline is unwound from the drum and straightened, and then laid on the seabed.

[0004] Compared with S-type laying and J-type laying, the assembly, welding, inspection and painting of the pipe laid by coiled pipe laying are all completed on land, with a good welding environment and high weld quality. In addition, due to the saving of welding time at sea, the efficiency of coiled pipe laying can be increased by more than 10 times. Coiled pipe laying has been increasingly used in the development of deepwater and ultra-deepwater oil and gas fields, and is particularly widely used in countries such as Brazil, Norway, the United States and the United Kingdom.

[0005] Throughout the reeling and laying process, the pipeline undergoes repeated plastic deformation. During the reeling process, the pipeline is wound onto the drum with a certain back tension, the curvature of the pipeline increases to the same as the drum, and the pipeline undergoes the first cycle of plastic deformation, and the bending strain in the pipeline is generally high. During offshore installation, the pipeline is unwound from the drum, passes through the calibrator, straightener and tensioner, and then leaves the ship. From the drum to the calibrator, the pipeline is first straightened and then bent again on the calibrator. In the straightener, the pipeline will be reversed to ensure that it is as straight as possible. The pipeline then passes through the tensioner and enters the water.

[0006] The pipes laid by the coiling method are subjected to repeated bending during the coiling and uncoiling process, and the stress conditions of the pipes are complex. In order to avoid buckling and instability of the pipes, it is necessary to model and calculate the overall process of coiling and laying to ensure that key indicators such as stress, strain, and ellipticity meet the requirements of the specifications. However, the entire coiling and laying process is relatively complicated, and a single modeling process takes a long time. When a large number of simulations are required for different pipeline parameters and different working conditions, the efficiency problem is particularly serious. Summary of the invention

[0007] The purpose of the present invention is to overcome the deficiencies of the prior art and provide a method for automatic modeling of a GUI plug-in for reel-type laying of submarine pipelines.

[0008] The present invention solves the technical problem by the following technical solutions:

[0009] A method for automatic modeling of a GUI plug-in for reel-type laying of submarine pipelines, the method comprising the following steps:

[0010] S1. Establishing a GUI plug-in based on the finite element software ABAQUS, wherein the GUI plug-in includes a main interface and five modules, wherein the five modules are a winding module, a calibrator module, a straightening module, an unwinding module and a submission calculation module;

[0011] S2, collecting the parameters of the winding module, calibrator module, straightening module and unwinding module as shown in Table 1 and inputting them into the GUI plug-in;

[0012] Table 1 Parameter units and meanings

[0013]

[0014]

[0015] S3. Click Submit Calculation Module on the main interface, enter the calculation file name, select "Write input" to generate the calculation file or "Write input and submit" to generate the calculation file and calculate, click OK, and after the calculation is completed, you can get the calculation results of the key indicators of the entire pipeline process, and then evaluate the pipeline situation in combination with relevant specifications.

[0016] The positive effects that the present invention can produce are:

[0017] 1. The present invention is based on finite element software ABAQUS, combined with PYTHON language and GUI plug-in, to achieve automatic and rapid modeling of the coiled pipe laying process of submarine pipelines.

[0018] 2. For the overall process evaluation of the coiled pipe, the main disadvantage of finite element analysis is that the modeling process is complicated and time-consuming. The software plug-in of the present invention only takes about 10 seconds to automatically model each model, greatly improving the modeling speed. In addition, the plug-in does not require the user to have high finite element expertise, thus lowering the technical threshold for evaluators. BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

[0019] Figure 1 This is a structural exploded view of the GUI plug-in of the present invention;

[0020] Figure 2 This is the main interface diagram of the present invention;

[0021] Figure 3 This is the interface diagram of the roll-up module of the present invention;

[0022] Figure 4 This is a diagram of the interface of the calibrator module of the present invention;

[0023] Figure 5 This is the interface diagram of the straightening module of the present invention;

[0024] Figure 6 This is an interface diagram of the unwinding module of the present invention;

[0025] Figure 7 Submit a calculation module interface diagram for the present invention;

[0026] Figure 8 A model diagram established for an embodiment of the present invention;

[0027] Fig. 9 This is a stress and strain time history curve diagram extracted according to an embodiment of the present invention. DETAILED DESCRIPTION

[0028] The present invention is further described in detail below through specific examples. The following examples are only illustrative and not restrictive, and the protection scope of the present invention cannot be limited thereto.

[0029] The entire software consists of a Python script kernel and a GUI user graphical operation interface. The Python script kernel is the source code for implementing the background modeling process; the GUI plug-in implements the user interface operation. The Python script kernel and the GUI plug-in are linked through the parameters defined by "def". Each parameter entered in the GUI plug-in has a keyword defined by "def" in the Python script and is stored. The structure of the entire GUI plug-in is decomposed as follows: Figure 1 shown.

[0030] The GUI plug-in includes 1 main interface and 5 modules, namely Reeling module, Aligner module, Straightening module, Unreeling module, and Job submission calculation module.

[0031] The main interface is as follows Figure 2 As shown in the figure, the picture above is an example of the model that is finally built, and below are buttons for 5 modules. Click the button to enter the sub-interface of each module. At the bottom are the "OK" and "Cancel" buttons.

[0032] (1) In the Reeling module interface, the top is a schematic diagram of the reeling parameters. There are three entities in the diagram: "Reel", "Shore", and "Pipe". In addition, this module will also create an entity "Gantry". Since the position and size of the Gantry are fixed, there is no need to manually enter parameters, so it is not reflected in the diagram. The parameters that need to be entered and their meanings are shown in Table 2 below.

[0033] Table 2 Roll-up module parameters and meanings

[0034]

[0035] Among them, the winding tension is an optional input parameter, which can be set after checking the checkbox "Specify ST instead of using default ST from DNV". If it is not checked, the winding tension is set by default to the minimum tension required for winding that is automatically calculated based on the pipeline geometry parameters.

[0036] In addition, the total length of the pipeline (L total ) consists of three parts: the first section of the beam unit pipe length L1, the shell unit pipe length L2, and the second section of the beam unit pipe length L3. L1 is a required parameter; L2 and L3 are optional parameters that can be set after checking the checkbox "Add a Section of Shell after Beam Pipe L1". If it is not checked, the pipe length is only L1.

[0037] (2) In the Aligner module interface, the top is a schematic diagram of the pipe leaving the drum and moving toward the aligner. There are three entities in the diagram: "Reel", "Aligner", and "Pipe". The parameters that need to be input and their meanings are shown in Table 3 below.

[0038] Table 3 Calibrator module parameters and meanings

[0039]

[0040] (3) In the Straightening module interface, the top is a schematic diagram of the pipe leaving the aligner and moving to the upper straightener and the lower straightener. There are four entities in the schematic diagram: "Aligner", "Pipe", "UST" upper straightener, "LST" lower straightener. The parameters and their meanings that need to be input are shown in Table 4 below.

[0041] Table 4 Straightening module parameters and meanings

[0042]

[0043] (4) In the Unreeling module interface, the top is a schematic diagram of the pipe leaving the upper and lower straighteners, then passing through the tensioner and lowered into the water. There are 6 entities in the schematic diagram: "Reel", "Aligner", "Pipe", "UST" upper straightener, "LST" lower straightener, "Tensioner", and the parameters and meanings that need to be input are shown in Table 5 below.

[0044] Table 5 Unwinding module parameters and meanings

[0045]

[0046] (5) Enter the calculation file name "Inp File Name" in the Job submission calculation module, then select "Write input" to generate the calculation file or "Write input and submit" to generate the calculation file and calculate, and click OK.

[0047] Example 1

[0048] (1) Determine the coiling parameters, calibrator parameters, straightening parameters, and uncoiling parameters for finite element simulation. In this embodiment, input the parameters according to the following table. It should be noted that for demonstration purposes, the check boxes "Specify ST instead of using default ST from DNV" and "Add a Section of Shell after Beam Pipe L1" are checked here.

[0049] Table 6 Parameters input in Example 1

[0050]

[0051] (2) Enter the calculation file name as "Job-1", select "Write input", and click the "OK" button.

[0052] (3) The final generated model is shown in Figure 8 . Figure 8 The entities in the calculation are: pipeline, drum, shore, pipe rack, calibrator, upper straightener, lower straightener and tensioner. After submitting the calculation, the pipeline will go through the whole process from rolling up to laying, and finally complete the calculation and obtain the result file. The stress and strain time history curves are extracted from the result file calculated in this example, see Fig. 9 After obtaining the stress-strain and other results, the pipeline condition can be evaluated in combination with the relevant specifications.

[0053] Although the embodiments and drawings of the present invention are disclosed for illustrative purposes, those skilled in the art will appreciate that various substitutions, changes and modifications are possible without departing from the spirit and scope of the present invention and the appended claims. Therefore, the scope of the present invention is not limited to the contents disclosed in the embodiments and drawings.

Claims

1. A method for automatic modeling of a submarine pipeline reel-laying GUI plug-in, characterized in that: The steps of the method are: S1. Establishing a GUI plug-in based on the finite element software ABAQUS, wherein the GUI plug-in includes a main interface and five modules, wherein the five modules are a winding module, a calibrator module, a straightening module, an unwinding module and a submission calculation module; S2, collecting the parameters of the winding module, calibrator module, straightening module and unwinding module as shown in Table 1 and inputting them into the GUI plug-in; Table 1 Parameter units and meanings S3. Click Submit Calculation Module on the main interface, enter the calculation file name, select "Writeinput" to generate the calculation file or "Writeinputandsubmit" to generate the calculation file and calculate, click OK, and after the calculation is completed, you can get the calculation results of the key indicators of the entire pipeline process, and then evaluate the pipeline situation in combination with relevant specifications.

Images