Stainless Steel Extrusions and Product Properties for High Pressure-High Temperature (HPHT) Applications

Extrusion process produces semi-finished product that provides significant savings in machining and fabrication of the finished components. Plymouth Engineered Shapes (PES) employs forward extrusion techniques to produce products up to 40 feet long that are utilized in power generation, nuclear, and petrochemical applications where it is critical to meet or exceed ASME piping, boiler and pressure vessels code specifications. The extrusion process has been successfully employed to manufacture components such as various types of valve bodies, manifolds, adapters and more that are targeted for elevated temperature applications up to 1200°F and under high pressures up to 10,000 PSIG. Critical product characteristics include flatness, straightness, twist, angularity, surface quality and dimensions over the full length. This paper presents an overview of the carbon steel and stainless steel extrusion process, the room temperature and elevated temperature mechanical properties, metallographic characterization, testing requirements and the applications of such products. Properties are also be compared to those produced by the conventional hot rolling and forging operations.