Category: Pipe Repair

18Jul 2016

Manhole Degradation Repair

By Robert Armstead

The City of Florence, in Kentucky, recently called upon Ground Works Solutions to repair five, failing sanitary manholes in their system, mainly due to a high concentration of hydrogen sulfide, which was degrading the precast walls of the manholes. Since the City of Florence had never used this application before, they were interested in this test to see if the quality was acceptable for additional future repairs.

Ground Works Solutions sealed all leaks and installed a one-inch thick, structural, centrifugally cast, cement liner for the full depth of the five manholes. The liner also included ConShield, a concrete additive to resist hydrogen sulfide corrosion. Thiobacyllus bacteria forms on the walls of sanitary structures due to the presence of hydrogen sulfide. This bacteria produces sulfuric acid that…

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10Nov 2015

Aged Infrastructure Causes Parking Lot Collapse at Mississippi IHOP

By Robert Armstead

Could you imagine, for a moment, enjoying your blueberry pancakes at your local IHOP and suddenly seeing half of the cars get swallowed up by the parking lot?  This is exactly what happened at a local IHOP in Meridian, Mississippi on Monday, November 9th, where 12 cars were swallowed up by a 30ft wide by 600ft long trench.

The parking lot collapse appears to have been caused by the failure of an old culvert that existed below the parking lot and located in front of the restaurant, making those upfront parking spaces not as much of a luxury as they might have appeared!

Below is a video by CNN discussing the event with Patrick Abbott, Professor of Geology at San Diego State University.   Professor Abbott speculates that the failure was likely caused by an old drainage culvert or pipe that had failed due to age, loose support soils and excessive weight on top…

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22Apr 2015

Sealing Annular Space in a Sliplined Pipeline

By Robert Armstead

In the United States, billions upon billions of gallons of stormwater are transported through the local sewer systems every day.  The pipes that the water travels through have different degrees of structural integrity.  Some of the pipes are as small as 8 inches in diameter and some are as large as 120 inches.  The storm sewers can be made out of brick, metal, concrete, clay and plastic.  As communities grow and these sewer systems age, local governments are forced to incur costs far beyond the material and labor to rehabilitate or expand the pipelines.  Government officials must also figure out how to alleviate traffic delays, as well as business interruptions and disruption to neighborhoods, which can add to the cost of repairing the stormwater system.

One of the oldest and most cost effective methods of rehabilitating an existing drainage pipe is called sliplining.  With sliplining, a new, smaller “carrier pipe” is installed inside the old, larger “host pipe.” …

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