Patent ID: 8061582

Claim:
A method of joining pipes on a vessel to produce an underwater pipeline, the method comprising the steps of: aligning two adjacent pipes along an axis A on the vessel; welding facing free ends of the two aligned adjacent pipes having a circumferential portion thereof extending away from the free ends that is free of a first layer to thereby define a cutback area about the adjacent pipes; extruding a protective sheet from an extrusion outlet of an extruder wherein the extrusion outlet is positioned adjacent and facing the cutback area; and simultaneously on the vessel: rotating the extruder and the extrusion outlet about the axis (A) as the protective sheet is extruded from the extrusion outlet while maintaining the position of the extrusion outlet relative to the cutback area; and covering the entire cutback area with the protective sheet by a single turn about the axis (A) of the extruder and the extruder outlet.