Identifying the Optimum Path and the Positions of the Bends in PVC and DI Pipes in Underground Water Lines.

Abstract

Consumable water distribution is a key service which is provided by any country. There are master plans working on this and from that proper piping systems are required for long term town and city projects to reduce maintenance, repairs and to continue the constructions cost effectively. Whole piping network consists of transmission region and distribution region to carry sufficient quantity of water from pumping station to the tower and from tower to the service areas. There is a special procedure to lay pipes called as concept of underground pipelines installation that is applied to keep the standardization of pipes by avoiding damages. In piping networks, bend is the most important part which helps to change the direction of the pipelines. (90, 45, 22½, and 11¼) degrees of angles are frequently implemented in bends. Compaction test, slump test, cube test, pressure test are done to maximize the quality and stability of bends indirectly. The aim of this research is to minimize the estimated total cost and project time, the amount of total bends of piping system, the head loss, internal pressure and friction of the pipes and bends and water leakages of pipelines in distribution region. As per these conditions, appropriate bending applications in pipelines must be created. The size of the population of the selected area is required to identify the pipe diameter and coordinates of bending path are required to identify the bend angle. Trench parameters (bedding, covering, surrounding) are measured to identify the horizontal and vertical placement of the bend according to the pipe diameter. Compaction test determines the quality of compacted soil that directly affects the load capacity of soil on bend. Slump test and cube test determine the workability and strength of concrete respectively, which can be directly used to identify the load capacity of thrust block on bend. The leakages on pipes and bends are determined by pressure test to identify the head loss of bends and thrust force in water. By analyzing developed mathematical algorithms for constructed constraints of each test and step, optimum solution is determined and total safety factor value for bends is also computed via bending application. The lower bound of the mathematical model of safety factor is 6.68.