Pipe bursting? Slip-lining? Butt fusion or electrofusion? There are almost as many installation and joining methods for HDPE pipe as there are applications, sizes and colors.
So, what's right for your project? Join as we cover the most common ways to join and install HDPE pipe. From side wall fusion to trenchless installation methods, you'll learn how to join and install one, monolithic HDPE piping system that's right for you.
Key insights include:
HDPE pipe fusion methods and equipment
When fusion isn't an option...
Installation methods: Open cut and trenchless techniques
City of Ft. Lauderdale 30" Force Main field example
Pipe bursting? Slip-lining? Butt fusion or electrofusion? There are almost as many installation and joining methods for HDPE pipe as there are applications, sizes and colors.
So, what's right for your project? Join as we cover the most common ways to join and install HDPE pipe. From side wall fusion to trenchless installation methods, you'll learn how to join and install one, monolithic HDPE piping system that's right for you.
Key insights include:
HDPE pipe fusion methods and equipment
When fusion isn't an option...
Installation methods: Open cut and trenchless techniques
City of Ft. Lauderdale 30" Force Main field example
Right. Welcome back to another version of this. Go inside. My name is Will Go Dark. The costume department had a good time with me this week. We've got some fabricated fittings and maybe an elbow reducer, too. Again, my name is Will Go back. I'll be the host for today's ESCO Insights. We've got a good show lined up, so thanks so much for joining us. Let's go ahead and start out for those that have not joined or even just a friendly reminder of how to participate with us today, all your video and audio is turned off to enhance the quality of the program. For feedback or troubleshooting on Zoom, you don't know how to use Zoom by now. Bless you. Please use the chat box and we will do our best to help out in real time. And lastly, Q&A, if you have questions throughout this process, this is highly interactive. We want to hear from you and answer any questions that you have. Please go ahead and use that Q&A feature that Zoom has. Our resident experts, Timi Tipton and Jeremy Becker, are live in studio ready to assist. And we will do our best to answer several questions on air. As always, I could not do this show alone. It takes a village, and the chief for that village is my good friends, Mr. Gary McVeigh. Gary, welcome back to ASCO. It's great to be here. I've been out of town this week and I come back and I got to stand next to this for the next hour in this shirt. So you might need some sunglasses. It's kind of blind. It's yeah, that's a that's a little rough, but it's not everybody can pull that off. Well, you look so professional. We had a yin and yang hat on over here. So tell the audience who you are, what you do, and why people should listen to you. My name is Gary Bouvet. If you're new to the show, I've been with Cisco 25 years, almost 26. Will, we're we're getting up there about as old as you are that I've been here. It is cold, but I've been in the HTP business for 30 years and a variety of roles and just want to help people understand a little bit more. Make HTTP simple for those folks who are considering and looking at it for their applications. Yeah, Gary's been an excellent teacher of mine and everyone at ASCO. I know a lot of you in the industry know Gary for his expertise. We'll be leaning on you heavily today, Gary, So thanks for being here. We've got a lot to discuss today. We are talking all about joining methods and installation methods as well. So with with HTP, obviously the number one benefit, Gary, let's just jump straight in is to use it, right? This is a product line that can be brought together under pressure to create a leak free, monolithic system. Why don't you explain a little bit more about Fuze and why it's crucial to absolutely everything we're doing? Right? I mean, that is the key benefit, Will, is the way that this is joined. What you're doing is taking two pieces and you're putting them together, creating one piece right, or putting ten pieces, one continuous piece with the way that we do it and we use heat and pressure are the key components to a successful fusion and that joint is a stronger, stronger than the pipe itself. It's monolithic. There's various types of fusions. The most common method is the fusion method end to end of pipe. But we also have sidewall fusion. If we're doing branch lateral connections where there's electric fusion options that are available. If space is a consideration. A couple other scenarios where electro fusion may be more beneficial and then small diameter socket fusion typically three inch and smaller, that we would use a socket fusion well, and we're going to go over all of these. But is there one type of fusion that's better than another? I mean, they're all good and they all have a purpose and a place in the complete system. Well, but again, but fusion is the predominant one. That's where we spend the bulk of our time talking about. Yeah. So let's let's maybe go over that again. You can see there we are bringing two pieces of pipe together after you complete a fusion. Those pipes are indistinguishable from one another and it becomes one entire system. So in our benefit or in our view, we believe the true benefit of HTP is that rather than having a bunch of joints out there, a bunch of mechanical connections, balanced, bigger connections, places that that that pipe is susceptible to failure, if you can. Fuze all of it. You're you're left essentially with one system right so let's talk about but fusion you mentioned it's one of our favorite methods of fusion here. Why is that theory? Well, I mean, you know, the main reason is the the the success, the strength of that weld. Right. It's stronger than the pipe itself. And it's one continuous piece. There's no paths for leakage on a but fusion. There's an ASTM standard associated with fusion joining that's ASTM F 2620 up to version 19 Polyethylene pipe. Now will in North America is available up to 88 inch in diameter in Europe, they even have larger than that. So then they'll sizes of continue to grow as we've evolved in the industry. Again the reliable pretty is second to none. Keep in mind polyethylene pipe, it's been used in the gas distribution industry for almost 50 years and this is the method that they do for joining their pipe as well. Right. And so it's a proven, proven successful joining them. Yeah, absolutely. And the other thing that I like about it, Gary, is you can follow this step by step method. No matter what the pipe size is, the diameter. There are some variables there, but I imagine Mr. Gary Busey in the kitchen took in a nice cast to roll filet minion, something really fancy. You follow a recipe, you know, every single time it's going step by step. So, Gary, I want you take us through these steps here. Yeah, you're you hit it on the head. These are the same steps, whether you're doing a half inch pipe or 88 inch. The variable in that is how those steps are completed. With the equipment, we have machines in the small diameters that are all manual. Once we then we get into what we call mid range and the process becomes semi automatic. Yeah, you do some steps, the machine takes over on some of the others. Then when we get into the much larger sizes, it's fully automated. It's really just a matter of operating the levers, the buttons, the controls on the machine. Right? Absolutely. So those steps that we'll reference, the first one is clamping. Then we where we hold the pipe in place, then facing. That's where we square the ends of the pipe, get down to clean virgin polyethylene. Then we have an alignment making sure our pipes are properly lined before we can do the fusion. Then we bring that do the heating where we drop the heater in and melt those pipe. It's the joining or the fusion method then takes over where we're holding those melted ends together under a constant pressure for a specific duration. And then the last is the cooling, which is all part of that holding that process and then inspection. Sure. So easy. Even I can do it. Everyone, the cool part about this actually is Gary. We had George Clooney out at our facility last week, did a black fusion at Weather Report here in Louisville. I believe we have some video. So why don't you walk us through what George is is doing here on this on this track? 618 Boy, that's a sunny day. And down here in Louisville that George was happy to hear. I guess he was probably seeing some family or something here in the local area scouting out the derby. So clamping the pipe, this is the first step. So we're bringing in two pieces, clamping and holding those in place so that we can safely do the other processes in the fusion procedure. And you can see the speed at George, Man, he's pretty agile for his age there. So pipes clamped in. Now we bring in that face or that face or drops in those. It has blades on both sides of the face or block. And what it's doing is it's trimming the ends of that pipe, getting any oxidation layer or any dirt area, getting down to virgin polyethylene, which makes better for the melt penetration. So once the shaving has been completed, you'll see those ribbons there that have been peeled off. The pipe ends, those get removed. And then now George is checking for the linemen, making sure the pipes are fully aligned square. There's no gaps. So when we bring in our heater, it's going to line up properly since the oily gloves maybe have touched the pipe ends a little bit. Little isopropyl alcohol to wipe and clean those ends now would bring in a heater plate heater is about 425 degrees and we bring both pipe ends in contact. The left side of this machine is stationary. You can see the right side is movable. Bring that forward with the hydraulic drop, the pressure. All we're doing is simply soaking those pipe ends against that heater. Just contact pressure. Once the time has been achieved, we remove the heater. You see the molten ends. Look at this here, the beer roll back and they are pushed together under a predetermined pressure based on the size and air of the pipe. And it's held there for a specific amount of time per the standard until it's completed. Cool. And we can remove it here. I think this is great because let's let's think about it. If you're going to be installing PVC Duct Alliance, I mean, we're looking at what what time for joint maybe say let's the six, six or eight inch, six or eight inch. I mean, realistically you're looking is approximate average 2 to 3 minutes per inch of diameter of pipe. Right. For your fusion type. Right. That is, you know, doing all the all the steps that we that we just walk through. Right. And that's going to change. Obviously, the bigger that get, the bigger the pipe, obviously, the bigger your time. Sure. And I think, you know, I'm getting to there is spend the 10 minutes, get a good joint that's going to last upwards of 100 plus years when designed correctly. Well, you know, and if we just took that time element, yes, it looks like this is way longer than joint and I'm going stick it pipe. But what you also have to take into account is the the end product. Right. Right. And also, where does that fusion occur after that fusion? It can be handled outside of the trench, right above ground. So you're not worrying about trench boxes and shoring and the safety of the operators inside that point. Such a good point. We got some great questions. Everyone Jacob is asking, how critical is it to remove the B that is formed on the inside of that pipe in question? Yeah, great question. So it really depends on the application that the pipe is being serviced in. Jacob If we're doing a force main, a pressurized application, that fusion bead has no bearing on the flow, doesn't act as a restrictor or anything with that, where we occasionally see the internal bead needing to be removed is when we get into a gravity application so we can prevent any puddling or ponding back behind that fusion bead. Ravi is asking, And I'm going to get to this next slide here, Bharat, if you could pull this slide up. He's asking what size range is covered in one machine? Do you want to maybe walk us through some of these various examples of fusion equipment? Yeah, there's a lot. Each machine has a size range and it's multiple sizes that can be done by simply changing or adding inserts to the fusion machine. So it all varies. But we have small hand machines like you see down in the lower right corner. That's a14 machine to do one inch to four inch. And then we get into the machine in the bottom middle, that's a28 machine. So that goes from two inch to eight inch pipe. Then we get into the next one there in the picture. That's at5 hundred machine that I actually do six inch, 220 inch pipe by changing out the inserts. And then again each one of those machines has a wide range of size capabilities with it. And what's great is here it is so we can rent used new equipment, provide equipment for the job site, whatever the pipe size is. You can see there that Talon, Gary, that looks like a 54 or 63 inch project there. So, you know, from from a little to LC of half inch pipe all the way up through 88, it goes up to 78. Yeah. So there is fusion equipment out there depending on the job needs and depending on the setup of the job as well. Right. So now but fusion is not the only type of fusion. Gary Sidewall fusion is maybe lesser used, but very effective when it comes to laterals and outlets and service connections. Right. Do you want to talk a little bit about sidewall fusion? Yes. So again, it's exactly what it's using. You're doing a sidewall if you're doing an outlet, you need a smaller lateral coming off the pipe. Maybe you need a an air air release that because of your changes in elevation in your pipe, any number of reasons why you may need to have some type of outlet coming off. So the main that can be done with sidewall fusion, we can actually sidewall Fuze up to 16 inch diameter outlets. Yeah. Now keep in mind what sidewall fusion will you have to be at least one size smaller than the the main size? We cannot do a size on size sidewall fusion, but sidewall fusion is a great way for us to for instance, I see a lot of projects that maybe it's a super force main. They'll install the 10,000 or so feet and then no one saw their air release valves after the project is done. This is a great way to do it with with a simple saddle combination. Exactly. And that and the reason being is if you try to put a reducing T or something in place, trying to maintain exactly where you want it positioned, where that during installation of the pipe main itself, sure, that makes it much easier to do it after the fact. It's tough now. There's just like buck fusion. Gary, there is a set of procedures here very similar, pretty much. Exactly. You want to walk us through the steps and what this I mean, very similar to what we did with Fusion. You've got the clamping of the machine, you've got the cleaning of the pipe ends, the alignment, the the heating, the joining, and then the cooling and holding time and then inspection. So really, they're basically the same. That cleaning section really takes the place of the facing. You're still roughing up the surface of the pipe. They're refusing to as well as the saddle, the branch saddle that you're fuzing on. Yeah. And Gary, you mentioned there's probably a couple of different types of equipment for this. There's the Sidewinder here, the right combination unit. It's also important to have those very specific heating adapters concave and convex style, to make sure that that joint is done right appropriately. Exactly. It's a size combination. So the Sidewinder that you see there on the left, that'll go up to four inch branch saddles. Okay. The largest you can do in the Sidewinder. You see that a lot in the gas distribution industry. That combo unit, while that's above fusion in the whole picture, if you zero in on that right side of that fusion machine, you see a tail stock with some chains. That's the sidewall portion of that machine. So you can actually take that off of the wheeled chassis, take that up for works, put it in the trench and do your sidewall fusion up to eight inch diameter outlets with this machine. And then when we get into larger than eight inch diameter branch saddle outlets, then we actually have a extend, basically an extended sidewall, if you will, sidewinder that we've built and used to do those larger fusions. Gary, I'm reading all the questions again. We really appreciate all this feedback. It makes the participation so much greater and allows for all your questions to come in. I'm reading these best I can for the time being. Some questions about fusion standards and certification processes. You want to explain what standards are governing HTP fusion and how we certify and train to those standards. So the big one is the 2620, right? That is that is our overriding fusion standard. That's what all the htp pipe manufacturers conform to for their joining of their pipe, which is very important for our industry to have one standard, regardless of who's htp pipe you're putting in. And that's what we that's what we follow to. Now we have an additional standard and may have to help me with the numbers, Will, but I think it's 3130, which is our technicians are trained to be trainers 2190, 31, 90 C it did I get that? Oh, man, I'm looking I'm looking at the experts back there. I thought I was so close to everyone. Yeah, but we're here for there's a lot of numbers out there. It's a lot a lot of numbers. On ASTM standards. But, you know, our technicians are our field text that we that can come out and do the work that also provide the training have to be trained to an extra level so that they could then issue certification for the well, you know, for the people, the clients that we may train. Yeah. Guys, let's take this opportunity to ask our first poll question of the day, which is when did you last speak on a project? Was it last week, maybe a couple of months ago, maybe you never to HTP And you're here to learn more a little bit more about that. Gary, what is going to be the overriding consensus here? I think it was the second one, Yeah. As always, Gary, you're about right. Believe it or not, we have had more than 350 responses to this, and most have specified 40% of specified HTP in the last couple of months. So that's fantastic to hear. And 20% have never specified. HTP So for those 20%, get those questions, come in and we'll see what we can do to maybe get you into that group. Yeah, getting into the closet. So okay, so let's keep going. Maybe get with, with another type of fusion, kind of the I don't know how to put it, the electrocution site is not spoken about in the in the kind of sort of ways. And I think sometimes for good reasons, sometimes it's it's maybe misunderstood. Do you want to tell people why we we really like electric fusion in certain areas and maybe others? Not so much. It has its place. Will all of these things that we're going to talk about today have a place in in our world, electric fusion is definitely one of them. It is a viable option too, but Fusion kind of originated for a need for repairs. When you've got buried pipe on both ends. If you notice in the fusion video will, we had to move one side of pipe to contact the other side of the pipe. And if you've got buried pipe and let's say you have to do a repair, you want to do an extension or you want it and you don't have that luxury of, you know, you've got friction loads and soil loads. Yeah, keeping it restrained and can't move to it. How do you do about fusion. Right. Right. So electro fusion has a place for that for repairs. The pipes been damaged and you need to put in a new section of pipe. It is as a method to replace but fusion it has to be dried just like your but fusion. Right? The difficulties come in as we get larger in size because there's a lot of variables that even the greatest technician can't control. Sure. And we have to account somehow account for that we're always going to look for. But fusion for an individual as a as the first method, right option. But again, sometimes that's not an option. Electric fusion can be a good one, but it does take the place of a but fusion, right? Instead of putting those two pipe bands together or using that coupling, it's got wires built in, embedded into the coupling that get heated up with a computer box or processor, as it's called, that injects current into this continuous circuit inside the coupling that gets heated up for the prescribed time based on the size of the coupling and those two ends are held together in that until it's cool, then it can be buried just like a section of pipe. So these questions are why I love this platform here. Tadd is asking about oval pipe. So one area that I don't think electric fusion is a good example for is pipe with a lot of mobility in it. You're taking a very round molded fitting, trying to slide it on over pipe and there's going to be gaps there. And that's where some failures are introduced. With fusion. However, you can take that over pipe likely putting the the larger side vertically tighten down those jaws and those jobs are going to help re round that pipe. Tadd So, so you're talking about shying away from using HDPE do the ability I understand that however using maybe a thicker D.R. prevent some of valid concerns there as well as maybe but fusion really can go a long way towards sorting out some of those ability issues. Right. So we've got a step by step process with electric fusion. Gary, I'm going to give you a break and have some water here. So with electric fusion properties cooling, proper setup is key. You want to make sure that you are cutting that pipe in a square 90 degree manner and you are removing any sort of rough edges around there, maybe even introducing a small bevel. So you're not ripping that copper wire out. You're going to measure that coupling half the distance on both sides, and then you're going to go ahead and mark those distances. So you know exactly where that coupling is in relation to the pipe itself. Once you've done that, you're going to go ahead and remove that oxidation that contamination, dirt, debris, whatever it is, go ahead and slide that coupling on over that clean virgin area of HTP and then you're going to go ahead and inspect everything to make sure there's no gaps around that coupling. You're going to do everything you can to eliminate the ability, any any kind of flat spots in that pipe whatsoever. And then we're using this this electric fusion processor there, which you see in the center of the screen that's going to take electric current. It's going to send it through to the actual coupling itself. And that's how we're going to generate that heat. It's going to melt those those htp areas up to about 425, 450 degrees. And you're going to go ahead and create that fusion using a combination of heat and pressure as well, and then obviously letting it sit and cooling. So we love electric fusion. Gary, when it's the right setup. We've also taken a lot of steps to make sure that the right tooling is out there, such as good processors, re round clamps. Do you want to maybe go over some of these here? Yeah. So you've got scraper tools and we'll talked about peeling, scraping the ends of that pipe. That would be what in but fusion what we did with the facer we're now doing it with the scraper so we're taking the outside oxidized oxidized layer off of the pipe and getting down to that virgin polyethylene that will help for the deep penetration of the coils, the re and clamps. You mentioned you talked about that earlier, that the pipe can get oval sitting on the ground. This can help facilitate and assist re routing that pipe to get that perfectly sized coupling onto the pipe insert. And then of course, you've got your your processor there in place with the lightning. You're going to need a generator, some type of power source to power the unit. If you're doing a lot of electrical fusion couplings. I highly recommend checking out his Municipal Advisory board document on electric fusion installed. They do a great job of going over all the tooling that's required. All of the industry leaders manufacturers have consulted on this. Please reach out to us if you'd like a copy that, we'd be glad to present you with that again. It's a great technology, just has to be used in the right places. So if we can't Fuze Gary, should I just abandon HDP and not use it? Absolutely not. Well, we've got options. There's there's always options with Gary here. So Gary, you have used mechanical couplings on several different jobs with great success. You want to maybe go over some of the the key things with HDP. Yeah. So there, you know, mechanical is another option when fusion just isn't a viable choice. The ground conditions, you've got a water still coming down the pipeline which would interfere with the successful fusion, whether it was bud or electro fusion, mechanical can be a good, effective way to make a make a repair, put in a new installation, what have you. And there are a variety of options, a lot of variables that go into these. You know, some of these are limited in size and availability. Some of these don't require any extra equipment, some require stiffness, some don't. So, again, restrained, some are not exactly. There's a whole host of lots. Yeah, lots of things there. The best thing is still get with us. Let us help you walk through and navigate that minefield of of options that can be available. But we've got we've highlighted a couple here in this picture, Will. We've got Vic Tarlac, obviously a very well known mechanical coupling in a variety of pipe markets. They have an HTP coupling. We have the role Mach alpha coupling, we have the Jorge Fisher multi grip. Again, all have different requirements necessary had limitations in pressure range. Yeah. There's no one right one one coupling for every application. And the cool part about these mechanical couplings is you can actually build kind of a pre-assembled htp system and just fitted together using mechanical couplings when time is a concern. We had a we've had a couple of plant shutdowns where time was a major concern and they did everything they could just to get a mechanical coupling in there. And that joint is, is is working and pressure rate is today. So can be a very good fit depending on your situation. And then we're getting some really good questions here, Gary, about repairs with HTP, typically we get the question. All right. Well, I love what you're saying. I love your shirt. We really want to use HTP, but we're scared when we have to repair it. So what do we do when we need to repair it? My answer is you repair it just like you would any other piping system, except you have more options with HTP. So, Gary, you want to talk a little bit about repairs and we'll go through a quick case study here. Yeah, absolutely. I'd love to sit here and say you never have to repair HTP. You will, right? But we all know the best pipe locator is a guy, inexperienced guy in a backhoe. Right? Right. He can find that pipe faster than any pipe locating tool I could ever come up with. So those third party damages are going to happen. And when they do, what are their options? And you mentioned it. Whatever you do with your existing the first thing is if you've actually got a full fledged failure like water coming out, you've got to get control of that, put a repair clamp on just like you would do with any other piping material. Right. Get a hold of the situation. Then you have time to evaluate what's going to be the best ultimate repair. Is it a full pipe replacement in that area? Is it putting in a couple of mechanical couplings? Can we do an electric you know, any number of those options that we've kind of touched on? But you get with this go or get with your local representative from Cisco. We'll figure out what's going to work best we can. Squeeze the pipe shut. We can put an air clamp around it, we can flange it, we can use it. There are so many different options. Let me paint a picture here for everybody. Beautiful Friday night in Georgia. We're about ready to go out, have some sodas after a hard week. And we get a call from one of our major customers that loves to use HTP. And they had a drilling pole operator drill into a main 30 inch effluent line for one of the one of the state's largest power plants. And they needed this line to be back up or they were going to have trouble keeping people like Gary cool indoors during the Georgia summer. So what were the options here? The primary concern for this customer was how to go about getting this done quickly. They needed speed, they needed something to be done immediately. So we went in there, took a look at the situation, and decided they also wanted a permanent repair. They wanted to dig this up and make it permanent. So what we decided is maybe let's let's drop in a slam spool piece, which we used some specialty fusion equipment to go ahead. We cut open that line, turn the system off. It's used on two flange adapters and then fit inside a flange assembly. Jerry This is a permanent repair that's going to last decades. The system is back up and running, and this took no longer than I believe it would have taken with another piping materials. So a lot of these items are on the shelves around the country at ESCO and other distributors like ESCO, there's no other distributor. It's really like installed, but there are a couple out there that do a really nice job as well. And you know, these things are going to happen very quickly. So if you do have a repair setting or you're concerned about your group's ability to maintain and repair these systems, as Gary said in the very beginning, we don't think you're going to have to do it that often because HDPE is just so tough. But if you do, there are plenty of options out there, out there for you, and we got it done by the end of the weekend, so we still had a good weekend. Gary Anyways, we're going to talk about a little bit of training here just real quick before moving on to installation methods. Believe it or not, that's a certification card. Somebody actually trained me to Fuze Pipe, I'm sure it's outdated by now. We are out of date, but do you want to just go ahead and tell everybody where they can find some training resources? Right. So we provide, as I said earlier, that 31, 90 ASTM, our technicians are trained to that. That makes them kind of a train, the trainer capabilities where we can cover. But fusion, electric fusion, sidewall fusion, any of those processes of joining methods that we've talked about, our our technicians can provide that the the in-depth training to get that card is about a day and a half to two days. It includes classroom work where you're under standing, not just how to run the fusion machine, but your understanding what you're doing in the fusion process, why it's so important for this step and to follow this just a certain way, as well as then getting the equipment of whatever size range that you're looking for. And we can offer that and that certification I believe, is good for two years, that certificate card on that equipment. But you go through the classroom, you do an actual fusion. We do a destructive test on the Weld, make sure that that joint is done properly and performs as it should be under stress. Gary, we are halfway through our presentation here and we're going to just we're going to mention the Fusion manual briefly here. If you're looking for a good resource to have with you at all times, keeping the back of your gene pockets, fusion manual is the place and the item to have it so good. Even our competitors use it. It covers fusion, sidewall, fusion, electric fusion in great detail, and it's a great reference for anybody that's out in the field inspectors that just want to take a look at things this free on our website where you can reach out to ASCO and we can send you guys some physical copies of this. So, Gary, we're going to move forward. I just want to be mindful of time here. Let's move on to the time, the second half of our act here. Act number two is talking about installation methods. So first and foremost with HTP, there is open cut. There's just the same way you would install any other pipeline. Do you want to maybe talk a little bit about why even working with HTP, an open cut type of installation methods is so unique, right? Well, it's, you know, we touched on it earlier. The big benefit with even for an open cut with HTP is the joining is done outside the trench so your operators are safer there away from the risk of having cave in or you're not messing with trench boxes and shoring and stepping your your trench depending on the size of pipe. So the pipe is fuzed and joined and then dropped in the trench. Now, a question, if it's not already in here, I guarantee it's going to come up. Do I need, you know, how do I build this? How do I backfill this pipe? Is it different than what I've been doing? And the the kind of the simple answer is no. Whatever you've been doing, if you've done PVC pipe, you would do the same bedding and backfill. Now, that being said, go into it a little bit deeper. There is the ability in many cases, depending upon your D.R, depending upon your soil conditions, your burial depths, all of those factors that you can drop htp pipe directly into the trench without any any special bedding, any special backfill that can be a time and a cost saver on many projects. But again, it's kind of those job by job scenario, right, that we'd have to look at and evaluate. The biggest concern and things that we always have to make aware of is point load, point impingement, areas on the pipe, no big rock points, things like that laying in the bed area of the pipe. So a good example of an open cut project is a project you're involved with at Texas A&M, where lots and lots, miles and miles of HP was used. Why don't you tell us a little bit more about that? Yeah, this was actually a camp district energy campus job. This is a hot water and cold water application all in the same trench as you can see here. And they this was a direct berry. They didn't have any special bedding or backfill required sand. They were using d r 11, which is pretty robust piping materials and that really was a very smooth process for for the contractors to do that. Installation job went so well. Texas A&M is using HDPE exclusively. It is their standard, their heating and cooling water. So this is just to show that we've got we're going to talk about some really creative installation methods here, but open cut still is bread and butter HTP daily a great way to use HTP and we think use everything outside the trench, drop it in afterwards. Safer, little easier. And in a lot of ways there are there are a lot of benefits to using HDPE in open cut applications. However, the real reason that we're here today to talk about HTP is trench lists, installation methods. This is South Beach, Miami. You're your home away from home. Gary Second home, if you look closely, you can see Gary sashaying down Ocean Boulevard there. Me and people, me and you and people looking at this HDP pipeline trying to get out into the nightlife scene on a Friday night. Yeah, we're in his private helicopter going over this one. But we're here to talk about the HDP and trench list installations, because trench lines, HDP installations, less trench provide a whole host of benefits once you tell us where they are. Yeah, well, the trench list is kind of a little misnomer because we still have some excavation with what we call trench list methods. We still have to have an entry pit, an exit pit. So we still have some digging to do, but we significantly minimize it with trenches and really will. This is kind of where HDP kind of got its gets its start in a lot of municipal type of applications. Right. The difficulty jobs that other pipes are built to handle and what do we do right. Oh, we can use polyethylene. Oh, yeah, we'll use that for a directional drill, a pipe bursting. Right. Those are methods that polyethylene is designed for. It's always the hardest stuff. Right. And then when they get to the more easy stuff, it just we we just are now moving back to do it for the whole thing. Right. So cost savings, labor saving safety, less interruption. Oh yeah. Fits are enormous. So let's go through. We're running a little short on time here. Let's go through some of these examples, a lot of questions on horizontal directionally drilling. This is kind of the gateway into gear. We've got a quick animation and this is pretty is common sense. Most are familiar with it and you see it drive around anywhere, whether it's fiberoptic is directional. Drill rigs are everywhere, but you basically have an entry pit, you have a drill rig set up these pushing rods through as these as his bore head on the front end is opening up a hole underneath the obstruction. This happens to be a body of water we're going under. Coming up on the other side in this simplified animation, will we simply remove the the spade head, the cutting head, attach a pulling head that's attached to the HDPE pipe and the pipe is pulled in. Flexibility of that HTP pipe lends itself perfectly for this application. One continuous piece of pipe fuzed together pulls it in. Now, in most installations there is a series of back rumors that they have to do that. You can see on on your photo there that back green or behind it that opens up the hole larger and larger to accommodate the pipe size that you're doing. Absolutely. Couple of questions. Really good ones about size limitations with HDD, Gary, we've seen some large directional drills with large diameter blown up all the time. Exactly. So 24 inch, not a problem. 36 It's not a problem. I've been on 42 inch directional drills and we've seen up to 50, for instance, 54 as in the Miami Beach, correct, in there. So really it's about design, it's about buoyancy, it's about lubricants for the drill. There's a whole host of factors, factors that go into it. We can certainly help with that or point you in the consulting engineer direction that might be able to. But please this as a really creative way to save the people, the installers and everybody around this project. A lot of hassle. In fact, that's what they did here in this Fort Lauderdale case study where a really bad problem became a really good example of creative use. Do you remember this? I do remember this project. It was an emergency. It was basically a break in the line and emergency repair. They couldn't didn't couldn't shut down the the primary road, the thoroughfare there. And so with the help of the contractor, Murphy, the utility service came up with a basically a directional drill job. You could see the pipe fuzed up there in the right hand picture strung out behind, but they were able to keep a lane of that road open and accessible for the folks, for the traffic. And there's you can see the footprint of the drill rig and they pulled that pipe in. This was job was done basically in three different poles. They also had a nice interruption with the one of the many hurricanes that that came through and disruption for a while, but still were able to complete 22,000 feet in less than nine months of installation and then open cut it one way longer and savings and look at all right. You know, that's you're not going to work every day having to drive around. That would not be a little tough. So we've got some actually some images and some video here of some of the the installation that's occurring. These are some really good images you can see here. Obviously, maybe the FedEx truck is having a tough day because it's got to go around. But for the most part, this is a massive amount of pipe to be installed in a very short amount of time. Creative use of equipment. And there are actually quite a big list of contractors that are able to perform this type of work. Yeah, and we can help with that, right? I mean, this is not work that we do, but we obviously assist them with fusion equipment, obviously with the material, any fitting connections that may need to be had after it's all installed. But yeah, very, very successful project. There you can see that the the drill rig, the reamer, the injecting, the bentonite, the mud lubricant that helps when you pull that pipe in. We can talk about that all go. Yeah. As we're going along, I'd like to ask one other poll question here, which is now that you're a little more familiar with the benefits of HTP before continuing, how likely are you to use HTP on your next project? I hope that you've learned a little bit today. We've only got a couple of naysayers out there, Gary. It looks like only four of the 300 people that have responded are not likely to use that. And I think they were offended by your shirt. Probably. I am too, at the same time. So really appreciate the feedback everyone. 54% is very likely and 37% said they'll consider it. So really good feedback. Thanks so much for that. Let's keep going here to Pipers too, Gary. Another really common method of trench list rehabilitation, more so for existing sanitary sewer lines. Typically, yeah. Directional drilling is for new pipe being pulled in. Pipe bursting is a rehab of rehabilitation. You're taking and breaking up essentially a hosepipe, an old pipe, and you're replacing that same in the same annular space, a new polyethylene pipe in its place that can include upsizing from time to time, depending on several factors. It always would have to be evaluated, but it is a great, great way to do a repair replacement of an old failing line without the the massive excavation of tearing up the entire road the street, because that's where you typically commonly see the pipes is out in the street. Absolutely. So the cool part about Pipers Singer is you can upsize capacity. So if the soil conditions are correct, you can take a 12 inch existing system and maybe upsize to a 16 inch line. In some cases in some cases more depends on a lot of factors. There are there we've I've been on jobs Well where we we actually increased from 12 inch to 24 inch doubled doubled the size. There were no other utilities around it in the area. Right. Which is not always the case. So the burial depth was plenty. So we weren't going to look like a gigantic mole went through the entire street. Right. So, again, all of those factors, it's a case by case basis on what kind of upsize we can do. So two different types of pipe bursting here. There's pneumatic and there is static. This animation is really just going to talk about, you know, some some differences. I believe this is a pneumatic system that we're looking at with this animation. But essentially you're taking a piece of HTP. There is a number of different manufacturers out there that manufacture this really specific equipment that is capable of pulling through that. HTP And at the same, in most cases, fracturing or breaking apart or slicing open the other host pipe. And right behind it you get this brand new beautiful piece of HTP that's going to last the test of time. So I told you we had some examples here. Gary, real quickly, we've got this looks like a pneumatic system here with a fracture wheel pipe, which is cast iron. Yep. Yep. And you can see the pneumatic head, the hammer that they call it is inside underneath that that area on the tool. And you can see it coming through. And as Will said, this is fracture pipe, you know, concrete pipe, cast iron pipe, things that that will break and fracture. We can do pipe bursting. But in the static mode where you're actually pulling the head through, this is pipe that is not fractured. Well, this is duct a layer, here's a repair clamp. And we actually cut through it in the leading end, sliced through it. And then when the expander head comes through, pushes, it, displaces it into the soil, making room for the new pipe. Yeah, absolutely. Gary, we've also got slip lining here not to move too quickly, but running a little without a time here so I could talk all day. And that's the thing. If you have questions, please reach out to Esko during or after this presentation. We'd be happy to talk all day about this stuff, which is what we love doing. So slip lining here is a really easy way to get rehabilitation or in some capacities, you know, just a better lifetime system from, you know, an existing, typically larger diameter line. You want to talk a little bit about slope planning. Yeah, really historic method of replacing you, obviously going to size down. You know, people say, well, what does that do to my flow as well? In many cases, even though you're going with a smaller size, you may increase your flows because of the smoothness of the HDP that your flow actually ends up being the same or even better, even with the smaller diameter pipe. But you simply you've got a push or pull method for slip linings. You're showing an animation here of a pull in using the winch to pull that pipe in. And then this is the push method where you actually use mechanical equipment to assist in pushing and sliding that pipe into the old post pipe. You know, typically, you know, we have about a 10% annual or space smaller. Sometimes they'll use spacers to center that pipe in there. It may just lay it on the bottom. Many in cases they pour grout around the pipe to keep it an anchor and hold it in place. Once it's slip line in a lot of questions about slip line injury, which is, okay, you're going to take a 54 inch line, six concrete, right? You're going to put in a 48 inch HDP. That's a smaller system that I'm certainly going to lose capacity or I'm certainly going to lose flow. Right? Maybe. Okay. Again, concrete C factor and it's probably in maybe 100, 100 and something around 90. Right? Right. Polyethylene 150, Right. They may actually get a better flow. Right. And that's why there's so many variables that it comes to. Don't just look at the IED or the odd of that system. We can help, you know, work through some those calculations when it comes to making sure the flow requirements are all set. I don't know if you had to show it, but there is another slip lining method that actually gives them a little bit bigger size. Or like always, you're ahead of the game. So I apologize for the calls in the tunnel though, first, before doing this. This is a creative installation method of using maybe some directional drilling equipment as well as some slip lining equipment. Once you go through this quickly and we'll share the video. Yeah, this one was an old basically a brick deteriorating tunnel and that they couldn't do a repair outside of Denver. You can see the small workspace they were provided a lot of to the work and trying to figure out how to do. I can't remember. I think it may have been like 6000 feet. It's like 7000 feet, about 7000 feet of pipe in one goal. So ingenuity used the directional drilling and equipment. I know there's a video somewhere on it they actually sent to drill drill rods through the pipe, grabbed a hole of the pipe, and then actually pulled using the drill rods in the drill rig to pull it back through the domain because they couldn't shut down the the existing line anyway either. So it had to be done while the flow was still still coming in there. There you can see the drill rig going through. You still see it's got full of the the waste, the know the waste coming through the line. And they actually there's the pulling head on the pipe and they use the force of that drilling rig to slip line all 7000 feet in one pole. Yeah, it was really an amazing project. It's an incredible project. Little pipe. Mike actually just texted me. It's a 7800 feet. Oh, he's correct. Yeah. He's always good for that. Yes. So you can see some fusion being done here. Again, large diameter fusion. Gary, we go on and on about this a lot, but just the flexibility, the toughness, the options that you have at your disposal when I think just are so numerous in comparison, are there. They didn't have it. They didn't have another choice. Right. Ultimately, this there was no other way to do. And that went from a 70 to a 48 that was pulled in and still enough provided enough capacity because of the smoothness of the HTP that we saw. Those are some happy humans right there. I think there's a high five the is in here at the Pole coming out there in one piece. You know, that's that's a job well done and a lot of design a lot of hard work went into that. So we're really happy to be a part of that project. There it is. Yeah. Gary, we're going to move on to you to spoke a little bit about compression, So you want to maybe go through the reason why we think compression fit. Other people call it suede lining, tight lining. A couple of different names for it out there. Similar technologies where you're doing all the you can to take away as much of that annular space as possible. This is like Tesla, NASA's Space X technology interface. Yeah, this is kind of unique. It's actually taking a larger, larger diameter pipe than what the opening is on the existing host. And we're compressed, we're condensing it, we're basically compressing it, hence the name compression. We're actually stretching it and hydraulically compressing that pipe to a smaller outside diameter for a temporary installation into the new into the old host pipe. And then once that tension is released on the pipe, polyethylene with its flexibility and having a memory will actually expand back and do a compressed type set against the inner wall of the hose pipe. Really cool technology. Let's go through this video here brought to us by our friends at Murphy Pipeline. Todd goes around the country talking about this technology for good reason. Yeah, it's really interesting. So here we're seeing that reducing die, pulling this HDP through and no joke, you're temporarily reducing the diameter of that HTP due to the inherent properties, the elasticity, the flexibility of HDP, and you're pulling it through basically a same sized system, exactly 24 inch. Maybe you're pulling out a 23 inch or 24 inch through it and you're pulling that all the way through. And then the very end, when you reduce that pressure, our attention on our press also, it reverts back to, you know, it's got a memory. It's going to revert back to that shape and you're going to get basically as as much of that annular space filled up. And we get to one of the questions that we get a lot ill. Well, what happens if the host type is gone? Well, it doesn't matter. This pipe can be it stand alone independently. If that that old host pipe corrodes, deteriorates away, the pipe that is installed in there can stand alone by itself and still function properly. Yeah. Eric's asking a good question, Gary. What are some of the lengths you can do with this technology? Wow. I every seems like every week I see a new person. Yeah. That somebody is doing links. A lot of that's going to depend. You know, you've got tensile limits on htp pipe, whether you're doing a directional drill or in this case a compression pole. So you're going to have limits. It's a lot of factors going to go into that. Many times the lines that we're doing have already inherent built in stopping points, manholes, etc., right where we'd have to have a stopping point anywhere. But it depends on wall thickness. Yeah, it's hard to give you a definitive concrete answer on that. Just know that, you know, I've seen upwards of two, three, 4000 feet pulled in on a on a compression fit run. So the Gulf Coast Water Authority did several of this of these types of installations totaling 6800 feet. We've actually got video of this, but this is a really cool trench, this project of the year. You want to walk through this video and yep, I think this part is do I know on that on that same video, it has a little bit of the the same thing that you showed. Will. So it's a replica of what we'll just showed you earlier. But here's the actual in the field and you can see right there at that juncture, that's where the compression of the pipe is actually occurring. So we're squeezed squeezing that down as it's being pulled through that dye head temporarily, as it's pulled into the to the hose pipe. And then once the tension is released, the pipe will have a memory. It goes back to its original shape and compression it gives the host long, very cool. We're getting a lot of really good questions about that. Really quickly, we want to talk about two other just methods. We want to talk about. I covered lightning rehabilitation. We also want to talk about maybe plow for some two other ways to join or to use HDP. You want to touch on those? Yeah, the snap type, it is a slip line similar to what? But instead of having fuzed joints, we have mechanical snap locking ends together for gravity. Applications do a lot of culverts, replacement old concrete that are failing, break culverts that they sleep pipe can be used in and. You're seeing that using the come a long chain to to snap those two ends together. They're usually you know 1919 foot lengths of pipe that we lock in doesn't require a lot of equipment on site. You don't have fusion equipment and so forth. Highway departments use these again a lot on the we have a whole other group that can really address the whole snap type if there's interest the plowing method, will we see that a lot in rural water? You're not going to do plowing in downtown Louisville, but out there in some of the more open areas, you don't have a lot of utility invasion. It's a great way, very, very fast way of getting pipe into the ground. They have equipment now will that can plow six foot deep pipe upwards of 20 up to 24 inch in diameter. Gary, look at that. The host did such a good job today that we've left off with just 5 minutes to spare. We're going to go ahead and get through a little bit of who Esko is. And I'll take this, if you don't mind. Esko is a national solutions provider of HDP materials using equipment expertise. We're basically a one stop shop if you're looking to to build a pipeline and you'd like to learn more about HDP, please give us a call. We have individuals, highly qualified experts all around the country, yards near you with stock materials, fusion equipment, custom fabrication resources like Timmy, Jeremy and Gary. You know, we really are a one stop shop for all projects, whether they're simple or complex. So we hope you'll give us a call. We're going to go through some questions. Please go ahead and connect with us on social media so that we can continue to engage. And we're churning out some really good content. I believe next month's Insights is going to be a brand new one about large diameter HDP. So please stay tuned. That's going to get upwards of 120 inches in pressurized it, go big or go home. And if you need see use today, this is super important. We have so many requests for PD HQ requests. Please go ahead and use this website. ESCO dash dashed icon, backslash CTU and fill this out and we will get back to you in 1 to 2 weeks. As our team is busy getting. All those questions and and see use filled out for everybody. So Gary, we've got a couple of questions here let's to go rapid fire let's go on Tad is asking can you sidewalk used on old pipe you need to do you need to round the pipe first or how is that done? Yeah. If it's old pipe it's going to be really just if because you looked at those heater adapters you mentioned concave and convex heater adapters are are size to the curvature of that pipe in that fitting. So if those aren't aligned properly, you're not going to get a good successful fusion. So we may need to use rerouting clamps around that area to to get that pipe exactly where we need it to allow for the fusion. Sure. Why not? Is asking how has HTP increased cost, parallel PVC and dip over the last year? I'm sure the producers are screaming right now will not answer this question. I'm actually going to take it. ACP over the last several years, I believe, has been the most competitive material from a price standpoint on a lot of municipal projects and industrial projects. Nationally, our supply chain doesn't seem to have been hit as hard as the other supply chains in which we compete against. And I really urge you, if you have a project and are looking for some budgetary comparisons, we'd be happy to show you those those. You know, what today's pricing looks like. And I really think you're going to be pleasantly surprised how well HDPE stacks up against competing materials right now. A lot of projects have been steered towards HDPE over the last couple of years, away from a material simply due to price and wait time. So give us a shot. I think you'll you'll enjoy the results so Gary can let me keep going. Where can we get a T-shirt like that? Rick is asking. Boy, I'm not Rick. Are you really sure you want one of those? I think that may be one of a kind, right? Don is asking, will HTP stand up to corrosive dirt? Oh, great question. Yeah, really good question. ACP is a very corrosion resistant material. Now, I'm not going to sit here and say that it it can't be attacked by something, but we'd be hard pressed to find it, particularly in in the dirt, unless it's some type of hydrocarbon that we may have to have a little bit more in-depth, consider ation and evaluation on. Gary, we are out of time. Oh, yeah, I know. It's it always slides when I'm with you, man. I'm having fun. So let's let's go ahead and launch one last poll question here, which is which of the following topics would you like more information on? We could really use your help. We're trying to create content for future months, and we'd really like it if you would tell us what topic you are looking to hear more about so that we can cater to, you know, what the industry is looking for in terms of information. So we really appreciate your help on this. Well, everyone's answering this. Gary, any final thoughts for the audience? No. I mean, you you said it earlier. If you're if you're on that fence of looking at should I try and HDP, I'm hearing some good things about it. Get with us, get with our team. We'd be glad to walk you through. And we're going to tell you if ACP is the right application for what you have. There are times when I've have to say, no, HDP is not a good choice, but take a look at it and let us help you. Absolutely. While I'm signing off. Please see, use pages if you need them. Go ahead and scan this barcode or go to ESCO dash pipe dot com backslash CTU for more help. You can also find it is go dash time.com. A ton of resources for all your future projects and current needs as well. So on behalf of everybody, here it is. So I want to thank you so much for spending an hour of your time with us. We hope you find this informative and please continue to be on the lookout for future episodes of Disco Insights. In the meantime, everybody, please stay safe out there and happy. Fuzing, as always, thanks for joining us on Cisco Insights.