This is another picture that was shared with me and is making the rounds on social media. It certainly appears to be a liquid (hydrostatic) expansion event on a stainless steel pipe. The story goes and I can certainly see this happening…
Valve installed when hot out.
Valve didn’t fully seat and allows vapor to pass into the lower pressure where it condensed when it got cold out.
When it got hot, liquid expanded, caused the valve to seat and balloon the pipe.
Sounds very logical and plausible, but the vent plug (threaded) that we can see in the pick is still in place. When I have seen these types of events in the past, it usually ends LONG BEFORE this level of deformation because some pipe component fails from the overpressure event. Hence I would have thought the pipe plug would have failed and relieved the pressure before the pipe got to this point…
Anyone with any information/data on this image, please share.