Plastic Piping for Submersible Sewage Pump Stations
Plastic Piping for Submersible Sewage Pump Stations
(OP)
What are the drawbacks of using FRP (plastic) piping within a submersible sewage pump station. Most U.S. municipalities that I work with standardize on ductile iron piping within a pump station. Plastic piping is commonly used in Canada, with excellent results. I am wondering if anybody can respond with logical reasons why plastic piping is not used...





RE: Plastic Piping for Submersible Sewage Pump Stations
The reasons given for not using plastic materials such as FRP are the fatigue life limitations of the product available. One has to consider the procurement practices of contractors and clients. With lowest price being the order of the day one then has to consider the quality of the product. DICL has a greater safety factor and is not susceptible to fatigue.
There is no reason that correctly design ABS, uPVC , PE etc could not be used. Provided that the fatigue allowance has been considered. The question of thermal expansion needs then to be considered.
All in all the additional design cost, special supports to accommodate thermal strain etc and allowance for fatigue would make plastic material more costly in such installations.
RE: Plastic Piping for Submersible Sewage Pump Stations
The thin walls possible with the nylon pipe causes less loss of ID when used as a liner. It is gluable, and light weight, but the unit cost per metre is high compared to PVC or HDPE.
Nylon 11 pipe use as liners for decayed iron pipes was pioneered in Sydney Australia to repair our decaying 100 year old cast iron gas supply system. Nylon 11 was very succesfully used in this application for the reasons stated above
eng-tips, by professional engineers foe professional engineers
Regards
pat
Please see FAQ731-376 for tips on how to make the best use of Eng-Tips Fora.