Boring - Trenchless International

Robotics
April 2010 - Trenchless International
Obama champions
robotics
The US Commerce Department will fund a $US8 million project to develop a robotic platform that will
repair and retrofit deteriorating water mains nationwide.
The funding was awarded to Fibrwrap
Construction Inc. by the Commerce
Department’s National Institute of
Standards and Technology (NIST)
Technology and Innovation Program (TIP).
Fibrwrap will work in partnership with Fyfe
Company and the University of California
to develop the project.
The funding for the project is part of
the NIST’s $US71 million Technology
and Innovation Program (TIP) as part of
President Barack Obama’s efforts to spur
economic recovery and address costly
societal concerns in the US.
Developing the technology
The funding will be used to build and
deploy a fully automated machine that
applies Carbon Fibrwrap using a wetlayup
technique for restoration of aging
water transmission pipelines.
The Tyfo Carbon Fiber system is
designed to prevent large diameter pressure
pipes from bursting, collapsing or
further deteriorating. The current method
Fibrwrap crew making preparations
in 54 inch pipeline.
Surface preparation in 72 inch pipeline.
of installation is a labour intensive semiautomated
process.
Fibrwarp’s CEO Heath Carr said that a
robot renewal method will reduce costs
to comparable to steel sliplining while
removing the need for excavation.
“Robotics have been built in the past
without success. This system is utilising
a proprietary technology that may enable
the device to layup the materials without
quality control concerns,” Mr Carr said.
The system has been used in the US to
strengthen pipes over the past decade. A
robotic approach to installation will allow
the system to be applied up to ten times
faster than manual application.
“In the end, these cutting-edge platforms
will monitor pipe health and restore
pipes quickly and efficiently – with limited
downtime for both water companies and
consumers,” Mr Carr said.
If successful, the innovation may be
used to strengthen lengths of high pressure
pipelines ranging in diameter from
8–202 inches.
NIST’s Technology and
Innovation Program
The TIP is a merit-based, competitive
program that provides cost-shared funding
for research projects by single small
to medium sized businesses or by joint
ventures, including institutions of higher
education, not-for-profit research organisations
and national laboratories.
The program will fund 20 projects
US-wide, focusing on the monitoring or
repair of major public infrastructure systems
and the practical application of
advanced materials, both of which are
particular areas of national interest.
US Commerce Deputy Secretary Dennis
Hightower said “President Obama is leading
an effort to drive economic growth and
solve national problems by deploying a
21st Century economy.
“These new projects will develop new
technology and material that will play a
critical role in modernising infrastructure
and developing the manufacturing company
across the country.”
Application of Tyfo Fibrwrap system in 54 inch pipeline.
The state of road gully
systems in Germany
Part 2
by Ing R Stein and Dipl-Ing H Cakmak, S & P Consult Bochum GmbH
Part one of this article (Trenchless International January 2010) introduced the approach to the survey on the state
of the road gully systems in Germany, the data pool, as well as project-specific key figures in the first part of this
publication. The second part of this article includes the results of questions concerning cleaning, inspection, leak
tightness testing, requirements for rehabilitation and rehabilitation costs, as well as a summary of the results of the
survey.
Did you miss Part 1? Visit www.trenchlessinternational.com and enter ‘road gully’ in the search field.
Cleaning of road gully systems
This section of the survey included
questions about the responsibility of
cleaning, cleaning methods, the number
of cleanings, and the accrued costs of
cleaning.
Solid retention of SB and SS
The function of road gullies is to collect
drainage from road run-off and
discharge it. This process also involves
collecting waste such as sand and
gravel, grit, leaves and cigarette butts.
Road gullies with floor discharge, known
as the SB type, retain solids by using a
bucket. Road gullies with sludge space,
known as the SS type, have a sludge
space that serves as a settling basin.
Figure 1 shows that SS types retain
twice as much solids as SB types.
The systems standardised in DIN 4,052
have a limited efficiency when it comes to
retaining solids. Furthermore road gullies
that are not cleaned before reaching their
performance limits reduce their already
low function of preliminary purification.
Depending on the local authority, the
amount of clearing material accruing in
the sewer networks varies between less
than 100 tonnes per year and more than
5,000 tonnes per year (see Figure 2).
Figure 1. Figure 2.
Process of cleaning road gullies
Although road gully systems are part
of drain and sewer systems, they generally
do not belong to the sewer network
and are assigned to the relevant road
authority.
In many towns, the relevant road
authorities delegate the responsibility for
operation and maintenance of road gullies
to the sewer network operators or private
companies, where a sewer operating division
is responsible. Financing is assured
through general budget funds of the road
construction offices.
The cleaning of road gullies is carried
out by the drainage department of the
respective local authority in 48 per cent
of cases, the relevant road authority in
27 per cent of cases or by private drainage
Figure 3. Figure 4. Figure 5.
companies in 25 per cent of cases (see
Figure 3).
Number of cleanings of SB and SS
For the participating local authorities,
the cleaning of both SB and SS occurs
every two years on average (see Figures
4 and 5).
With SB types, cleaning of the bucket
is carried out manually 54 per cent of the
time and via suction vehicles in 46 per cent
of cases (see Figure 6.a), this is compared
with SS types where cleaning is undertaken
via suction vehicle in 97 per cent of cases.
It is uncommon that a manual cleaning is
carried out on SS systems (see Figure 6b).
The distribution of cleaning costs of
SB and SS differs considerably, with
the cleaning of an SB averaging at
industry review
April 2010 - Trenchless International
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