Drainage Design Flexibility

Enormous drainage design flexibility is possible with concrete pipes due to a wide choice of standard pipe sizes and cross sectional shapes. They can be used as storm sewers, foul sewers, culverts, attenuation tanks, soakaways, pumping chambers, rainwater harvesting tanks and even ground source renewable energy systems. Concrete pipes can be manufactured as bespoke solutions, including chambers with in-built weir walls and hydraulic devices such as hydrodynamic silt separators and vortex flow regulators.

Concrete pipeline products can even be modified on site to accommodate a wide range of solutions whilst maintaining structural integrity.

Standard pipe sizes range from DN225 to DN2400 and manholes DN900 to DN3000 are readily available. One –off solutions can also be offered for larger sizes.

In some situations, it may also be possible to provide higher strength class pipes to meet particularly onerous design loads.

For specific manufacturer product information see our members page.

The rigid nature of flexibly jointed concrete pipes provides additional advantages in terms of structural and hydraulic design.

As the pipe itself forms part of the pipeline structure, a number of alternative bedding designs may be considered. This can lead to substantial installation cost and time savings in addition to reduced environmental impact when compared with a full granular surround.

The fact that concrete pipes do not deform or lose their shape also means that hydraulic performance is preserved. Deformation at the joint can lead to compromised performance of the seal and pipes that change their shape over time, both in terms of the cross-section and longitudinally, can also reduce hydraulic efficiency of drainage systems.

Link to factsheets

An elliptical pipe in a constrained area under a
gas main and with minimal cover depth under a road.

Access via side entry manholes can be incorporated into the pipe itself, eliminating separate construction of chambers and saving time and money.

Special junctions and hydraulic features can be incorporated into the design and pre-built in a factory controlled environment.