New Deep Burial Testing Facility at Queen’s University

Laboratory testing to evaluate buried pipe systems under deep burial is needed to evaluate the response of a variety of culvert and sewer pipe products for a range of deterioration conditions and backfill soils. The cost and the time associated with experiments on highway and sewer structures in the field are significant. Until recently no facilities have existed to evaluate larger diameter pipes, to test pipes in saturated ground, or to allow the behavior of pipe joints at deep burial to be investigated. A new deep burial testing facility that is 3 m wide, 5 m long, and 4.6 m deep has been constructed at Queen's University to permit deep burial testing on pipes with diameters up to 3.05 m. The test pit is sealed, so that deep burial experiments can be conducted in saturated ground, permitting seminal studies of soil erosion caused by groundwater flow into the leaking joints of sewer pipes or perforations in deteriorated culverts. Selected results from a commissioning test on a 3.05 m diameter steel reinforced polyethylene pipe are provided.