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vehicle drivers/operators to ensure that they never have the vehicle on the road at weights in excess of these permitted for the vehicle type and design.
One further recent development has been the introduction of Lithium batteries into the mix. Whilst not a low cost option they do today offer increased battery life with a lighter weight battery construction so offering advantages in two areas.
VEHICLES FOR RENOVATION OPERATIONS
There is of course one other area of interest where vehicles are a vital component in the servicing of the drainage sector that of pipeline renovation. Here too there are numerous options and requirements that must be available at site for the successful completion of any renovation works.
At the smaller end of the scale where perhaps the local drainage contractor operates a jetting system alongside a push rod camera there may also be sufficient option to introduce a storage and workspace for the installing ambient cure linings. Here it is simply a case of ensuring the vehicle does not exceed the weight limit discussed previously once loaded up with all it ‘gear’.
There are several other vehicle types that operate within the pipeline renovation sector. Once contractors go beyond the use of basic ambient cure linings there is the need to have on-board the lining support vehicle various facilities to keep the lining safe and secure prior to installation such as refrigeration capability for those liner types that use cured using the application of heat, such as hot water cure and steam. For these also there is the need to have on-board boiler facilities or a steam generator which both bring with them safety and operational concerns that must be allowed for in the vehicle design.
In some cases even today liners are wet-out on site which in turn requires a vehicle that will enable such an operation to take place whilst taking account of the safety concerns for both operational staff and passer-by when large volumes of resins etc. are in use.
Specialist renovation systems also employ highly specialised vehicles for example where UV cure is used for the lining system. Whilst UV cure offers advantages of shorter cure times and therefore site occupation time, the control systems involved when undertaking UV cure often if not always require a highly specialised truck for the control and power station systems.
For other lining options such as slip lining or
modified slip lining there is also a need for specialist vehicles with on-board liner production and control requirements that are far too extensive to detail here. Suffice to say these vehicles generally fall into the larger vehicle category and so require special licences for drivers as well as larger site footprint availability for the works to be completed.
Many of the vehicles used for renovation works also require the use of trailers and so will also fall into the operational categories mentioned previously. Some of these will involve trailer mounted coiled pipe which in turn brings with it safety issue with the coiled pipe potentially having significant energy stored in the coil to cause significant damage to persons or property should it come loose. So whilst this article may concentrate on the vehicles in question in transport and support of the drainage sector any and all aspects of the vehicle/trailer combination needs to be fully understood and monitored and transported with care and efficiency at all times.
Again speaking with Tracto Technik UK, there has also been some increase in companies searching for action-specific vehicles that are designed and arranged to efficiently and effectively execute specific jobs. One example of this sort of request has been the on-going development of a manhole cover replacement system using coring techniques. The vehicle has been designed and set up to utilise coring technology to excavate around the old existing manhole cover position, lifting the old manhole cover out in its entirety. This is then removed and the new manhole cover is picked up and positioned into the excavation. The new cover is held in the right position at the right level in relation to the road surface and a resin is then injected around it directly from a mixing system on the same vehicle. This is allowed to set whilst the cover is held solidly in place. Once the resin is cured the corer releases the new manhole arrangement and it is left in place as a completed manhole cover replacement and the vehicle moves on to the next manhole replacement location.
WHERE TO FOR THE FUTURE
As can be seen from the above the breadth of vehicle types supporting the drainage sector is absolutely vast and the right vehicle has to be selected for the right job as well as having the right driver with the right licensing and training. Whilst this sounds so obvious it is quite a regular occurrence to see, particularly spoil removal trucks leaving a trail of waste material in their wake even today, usually because the wrong truck was sent to site but there is no time (or sometimes inclination) to change it. Whilst the vast majority of vehicle users do plan well and make use of the right vehicle there are still in some places those that do not. It is to these that the industry must turn to make sure that the few do not mar the industry as a whole by incorrect use of vehicles serving the drainage sector.
It would appear that the main thrust for future vehicle use is that whilst vehicles will not be seen to be leaving their support functions across the industry anytime soon we may well be seeing so significant changes in design and operational capability over the next few years. Manufacturers are continually looking at what can be done to lighten the load whilst making the vehicles more capable and multi-functional. Lighter materials, better equipment design using modern materials, better and lower emission power sources, better training for personnel and improved communications and connectivity will allow much more work to be completed far more efficiently, with few units than ever before. The facility to make decisions based on the information provided by multi-function vehicles will allow immediate or measured responses to pipeline problems to be managed more effectively minimising the impact on the pipeline systems themselves and on those that use them (even when they don’t really know that they are using them). With the right algorithms and the right connectivity we may yet even get to
22 drain TRADER | October 2017 |
www.draintraderltd.com
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