scope:

The purpose of this paper is to review methods for using experimental data to improve structural dynamic models of pressure vessels, piping systems, and their support and restraint systems. The importance of these systems has increased in the last 2 decades with the use of pressure vessels in nuclear power plants subjected to severe thermal, hydraulic, and radiation operating conditions as well as accident loads such as earthquakes. The complexity of the systems and the severe consequences in the event of their failure call for the highest level of theoretical analysis to develop their structural dynamic models, usually by finite element techniques. That very complexity also implies a need for confirmation and improvement of their structural dynamic models by experimental methods.