The industrial revolution brought with itself several innovations that changed the world. However, if you look at the bigger picture you will realize that to support the massive projects of the big companies, a lot of smaller but important companies were also set up. These supporting companies focused on creating components that would assist the machinery and operations of the big companies. One such important part that these companies were making (and still make) include an expansion joint.

An expansion joint or a movement joint is a complex assembly that is designed to handle the expansion caused by the rise in temperature, vibrations, movement due to other parts of the machine and to keep the parts of a structure together. We know that every material expands on heating and how vibrations can eventually break the strongest materials. An expansion joint in such a case ensures strength and safety.

Over the last few years, several different types of expansion joints have made their way into the market. All these expansion joints focus on solving the problems related to expansion and contraction of material under different circumstances. A few areas where one can find expansion joints in action include piping systems and ships. An accurate implementation of a movement joint ensures crack proof and leakage proof structure.

Expansion joints have been an important part of several big projects. In fact, without these critical assemblies, it would have been impossible for the construction companies to complete the projects on time. One of the Germany’s biggest construction project which made use of kompaflex expansion joint was recently in news where the axial, lateral and pressure balanced kompaflex joints played an important role in the success of the project.

The recent natural calamities have forced the engineers to rethink the expansion joints and come up with assemblies that can handle more than just the weight of the structure and expansion of the material. As a result, a modern day assembly can not only withstand high thermal expansion and contraction, it can even accommodate high speed winds and gusts of air, earthquakes and shaking of earth due to unnatural reasons and sudden failure due to low quality construction material.

All these developments have given rise to a host of different kinds of expansion joints like fabric, metal, toroid, in-line, and refractory lined joint. All these movement joints have a certain function and cater to a very specific area of application.

While it won’t be wrong to say that expansion joints save the massive structures from collapsing under the effect of temperature and pressure, there are several reasons as to why an expansion joint may fail. A few common reasons include improper installation, wrong handling methods, insufficient protection, corrosion, over-pressure and over dependency and excessive torsion and bellows deflection.

Expansion joints have been helping the builders and the engineers to come up with great designs without worrying about expanding parts of the system. However, carelessness with these parts can lead to failure of the assembly and the complete structure at large. Thus, it is important to do the research on the stress and vibrations that the intended movement joints would need to handle.