101 Rules of Thumb for Integrity Engineers

By Clifford Matthews

Overwhelmed by the complexity of integrity assessments on pressure and static
equipment? Save time with this collection of simple guidelines, rules of thumb and
base-case examples. We’ve combined the quickest and most usable guidelines from
the world of integrity assessment to help you out. There’re clever little rules on:

• Failure types (they’re not all the same)
• DMs and FMs
• Tricky IOWs
• Accepting risk (it pops up everywhere)
• Living with defects
• Integrity and FFS calculations
• Avoiding ‘dead data’
• Damage tolerance
• Choosing CMLs
• Non-intrusive methods
• Temporary repairs
• What happens when something fails?

And much more

Got an integrity problem?
Rules of thumb are the quickest way to avoid technical dead-ends. Most of the rules can
be applied to vessels, piping, tanks and structural components.

Rules of thumb?
They’re everywhere. Rules of thumb are broad statements of principle. If you follow them,
things turn out better. No rules are unbreakable, otherwise they’d be laws, so there’s
flexibility built in. Anyone can use them.

Information is drawn from real integrity/failure cases, codes and recommended
practices, taking you straight to the information that matters. Don’t get involved in
detailed integrity assessments until you have checked out the 101 rules in this book.
They could save you time and money.

Look at integrity engineers and you’ll find NDE technicians, plant inspectors,
metallurgists, corrosion engineers, maintenance engineers, welding engineers and
others. This book is for all of you.