Getting Started
PipeFEA is a browser-based pipe stress and flexibility analysis application. You build a 3D model of a piping system, assign materials, sections and design conditions, place supports, and the solver evaluates it against ASME B31.3, ASME B31.1 or AS 4041 — including thermal expansion, pressure, weight, wind, seismic and buried-pipe effects.
Signing in
The app lives at pipefea.com/app and requires an account (email or Google sign-in). Your subscription tier controls access to Pro features — cloud project saving, wind/seismic loading and comparison reporting. Everything else works on the free tier.
The analysis server sleeps when idle on free hosting. The app wakes it as soon as you open it, but if you solve within the first minute you may see "Analysis server is waking up…" — this is normal and resolves in under a minute.
The interface
The screen has three areas:
| Area | Purpose |
|---|---|
| 3D Viewer (centre) | Interactive model view. Orbit with left-drag, pan with right-drag, zoom with the scroll wheel. Click any pipe or node to open it in the Inspector. |
| Design Palette (left sidebar) | Tabbed editors: Route, Elements, Library, Soil, Assign, Specs, Settings ⚙️, Files 💾 — plus an Inspect tab that appears when something is selected. |
| Analysis Controls (right panel) | Project name and auto-save status, Undo/Redo, Load Case selector, Check Model, Grid Editor, Run Analysis and Run All Cases buttons, and the results table below. |
On phones and tablets the same features are arranged into Viewer / Model / Results panels with a compact toolbar.
Viewer toolbar and overlays
- 🏷 Labels toggles node ID labels.
- Scale slider (appears after an analysis) exaggerates the deformed shape from 1× to 50×.
- ⛓ Preview Analysis Mesh (bottom of the viewer, pre-analysis) shows the solver's expanded mesh — bend tangent points, tee weld nodes and rigid flange stubs — before you run anything. See Productivity Tools.
- After an analysis, pill buttons switch between Pre-Analysis, Static Analysis (deformed shape + stress colouring) and Modal Analysis views.
- View presets (Top / Front / Side / Iso) and 90° rotation buttons are in the viewer corner.
Stress colouring
After a solve, pipe is coloured by its worst code-stress ratio: blue (< 30 %), cyan (30–60 %), amber (60–80 %), orange (80–100 %), red (≥ 100 % — code check failed). The legend appears in the top-right of the viewer.
Undo, redo and auto-save
- Every model edit is undoable: Ctrl+Z (undo), Ctrl+Shift+Z or Ctrl+Y (redo), or the ↩ / ↪ buttons. The history keeps the last 20 states — including big operations like PCF imports, support generation and grid edits, which each undo as a single step.
- The model auto-saves to your browser about 1.5 s after every change (watch the Auto-saved ✓ indicator). Closing the tab and reopening restores your session.
- Auto-save is per-browser. For anything you care about, also export a .psm file or use Save to Cloud — see Files & Projects.
Units
Choose Metric (SI) or Imperial (USCS) under Settings → Unit System. This is a display setting — the stored model is always metric internally, so you can switch back and forth freely. Each input field shows its current unit in its label (mm/in, m/ft, MPa/psi, °C/°F, kg/lb, N/lbf).
A 60-second orientation
- Settings ⚙️ — pick the design code, units, pressure and temperatures.
- Library — create (or load from the catalogue) a pipe section and material.
- Route — draw the pipeline node by node, adding bends, valves and flanges as you go, with restraints placed inline.
- Check Model — one click validates the geometry before solving.
- Run Analysis (one load case) or Run All Cases (the full code case list).
- Read results in the viewer, the results table, and the PDF report.
The First Model tutorial walks through this end-to-end in about ten minutes.