VACUJET Heavy Solids Sewer Cleaning at Railyard | Macon, GA

HEAVY SEWER SLUDGE REMOVAL PROBLEM

Remtech was engaged to clean oily sand deposits (tar sands) from engine terminal sand pits and wastewater sewer.  Sand pits were cleaned by conventional hi-rail vacuum truck extraction (two-thirds of this project). Sand and lube oil had accumulated in 1,000 ft of a 24-inch ductile iron wastewater pipe over a decade presenting a unique cleaning problem.  Deposit depths ranged from 4" to over 18-inches. Portions of this sewer had inadequate slopes.

VACUJET TAR SAND REMOVAL SOLUTION

Initial attempts to clean the sewer via conventional jetting techniques proved non-productive due to the weight of deposits, long fluidization distances between manholes, and sag points in the line.

Two additional manholes were installed to shorten cleaning distances to 300 ft. A 90o elbow clog point (without a manhole) was removed. Remtech developed a proprietary horizontal hydroexcavation technique VacuJetTM. VacuJetTM is a combination jetter/cutter head attached to a cable driven four-inch vacuum line to fluidize and remove solids over long distances.

A cable glide hose system was run down hole and horizontally between manholes to navigate 90 degree directional turns, minimize friction and maintain solids flow. A winch with a high tensile strength synthetic line or cable dragged the cutter head and vacuum hose through 300 ft sewer sections. An estimated 11,750 gallons of solids were removed using this method.

VACUJET TAR SAND REMOVAL COST/BENEFITS

1. Conventional jetting cleaned approximately 200 ft of 24” sewer in 15 days.

2. VacuJetTM (developed on this project by Remtech) removed heavy solids from 800 ft of sewer in four (4) days. This new method successfully removed heavy solids that conventional jetting previously would not.  Sewer cleaning costs for heavy solids over long distances between manholes, and for sewers with inadequate slopes was substantially reduced.