Fabric Expansion Joints
We understand that using the right expansion joint is not just critical, but essential in operation environments that are demanding, require reliability, and have rigorous processing needs —such environments include refineries, power plants, waste to heat systems, metal foundries, pulp & paper mills, mining and metallurgy, water delivery systems, wastewater systems, pharmaceutical, automotive, food and beverage, and both the chemical and petrochemical industries. In particular, all of these industries and associated plants operate using high temperature gaseous media such as air, gas turbine exhaust, flue gases, with many different acidic and alkaline gases.
Correctly designed and selected fabric expansion joints are often the answer for keeping all of these various operational environments safe, without costly downtime from a poorly designed and incorrect material selection.
Helfrich Brother has the expertise to not only assess your expansion joint requirements, but to assure the correct design and materials are used, the correct sizing, shape, and to utilize our crews for the installation, and our unmatched customer-first maintenance services. We offer American-made fabric expansion joints as part of a complete turnkey experience that ensures quality, reliability, maximizing performance, and getting the best service life from our complete line of expansion joints.
Why use Fabric Expansion Joints?
Fabric expansion joints are non-metallic and that provide flexibility and lower stresses on piping and ducting systems and their supports and guides. Their benefits over rigid metallic expansion joints include:
- Limits thermally induced stresses in ducting, ducting supports, and related equipment. The standard design can endure a temperature of 1200˚F but can be specially designed to withstand temperatures up to 2,500⁰ F.
- Eliminates excessive flow induced vibration associated with the transfer of hot gases through the ducting systems of gas turbines and furnaces.
- Isolates and compensate simultaneously for large axial and lateral movement, as well as angular and torsional rotation, without spring loads—in a small space and with almost no reactive forces
- Lightweight for reduced load on the ducting and piping and increased safety for plant personnel
- Allows for the misalignment of ducting and equipment
- Can be fabricated from corrosion and chemical resistance materials
- Easy installation and low maintenance, with very low cost of replacement if needed
- Avoids the removal of large components for installation
- Fabric expansion joints are easy to customize to suit existing operating conditions
- Lower shipment and installation costs, with high life expectancy.
- Fabric Belt only replacement where possible reducing costs of ducting and fabric frames

Why Choose Helfrich Brothers?
We are the experts in piping, and consider every aspect of the design, installation, and maintenance.
- Design: With the countless dimensions and operating conditions in industrial plants, the choice of fabric expansion joints can’t be limited to standard options. Fortunately, the unlimited flexibility of fabric expansion joints gives our engineers many design options—such as materials, number of layers, and lamination. Our expert in fabric expansion joints has more than 30 of experience to understand how to meet your operational specifications.
- Installation: Our engineers install with care, extending the life of a system component and enhancing the total lifespan of the whole system.
- Piping Alignment: Our accurate installation prevents misalignment, along with proper pipe placement and support.
- Siting: We install pipes in accessible locations to aid in inspections, transport of hazardous materials, and protection of personnel in case of leakage or failure.
- Maintenance: We can inspect fabric expansion joints to reduce risk, identifying issues such as leaks, corrosion, or any other kind of wear and potential hazard that could cause an unplanned outage or maintenance issue.
We offer Fabric Expansion Joints for:
- Boilers
- HRSGs
- Stacks
- Gas Turbine (Exhaust)
- Fans
- Flue Gas Ducts
- Pipe Penetrations
- Scrubbers and other Gas Recovery Systems
- Select metal expansion joint applications upon request
Our Engineering & Field Services include:
- Tailor-made fabrication of almost any kind of fabric expansion joint in the market
- Turn-key services, including inspection, surveys, FEA analysis, installation, scaffolding, and removal
- Repairs, quick turn-around replacement, and technical support
- American-made, manufactured in the Lawrence, MA facility.