Thermoelastic analysis of thick pressurized cylinders

In this work, the thermoelastic analyses of the thick-walled cylinder and the nuclear reactor pressure vessel problems are studied using Finite Element Method. The two-dimensional finite element code for coupled thermoelasticity with conductive, convective, and radiative boundary conditions is generated, which is used to analyze the thick-walled cylinder and nuclear reactor pressure vessel cases. The elements are 8-noded quadrilateral for both thermal and mechanical solids. The mesh finery rates of the models for the thick-walled cylinder and the nuclear reactor pressure vessel are determined according to the agreement of the results with the ones obtained by ANSYS. To verify the obtained results, geometric models of the cases are generated within ANSYS and corresponding finite element types are utilized. Results are compared with ANSYS results.