Abstract
Pipes made from glass fiber reinforced polymer have a competitive role in the petroleum industry. These types of pipes mainly be set up underground to carry waste water in petroleum field. The environment of the pipes underground besides the effect of water condensed with chlorine gas creates chemical corrosion (degradation) for composite polymeric pipes. The chemical corrosion in such polymeric material is in the form of degradation in fracture and mechanical characteristics. Therefore, the degree of corrosion is determined through its effect on the mechanical and fracture properties of glass fiber reinforced pipes. Therefore, tension and bending tests are performed to obtain the mechanical properties of (GRP) before and after corrosion and a compact tension test is carried out to obtain the fracture toughness of such material. As well as the tests are performed before and after immersion in corrosive waste petroleum water for about 1,440 h. The degradation that is induced in the mechanical and fracture properties are observed. The measured fracture toughness in the compact tension test is influenced by the effect of the corrosion water. Alternatively, a bending test is more acceptable for such brittle material.