Physical And Mathematical Modeling Of Surcharged Sewer Manhole Flow

This paper describes research on surcharged manholes for wastewater and storm water. Experiments were designed for assessment of pressure/energy loss for different manhole configurations and flow conditions. The physical modeling was done in full scale with a concrete man hole with inlet/outlet pipe diameters with approx diameter DN 100/150 mm, water flow rate of up to 50 l/s and a surcharge up to 1 meter. The results from the physical model were intended to calibrate and verify the mathematical modeling results using the Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) software Fluent. The physical model did not reproduce the mathematical model completely because of different flow conditions in the two sets of experiments; therefore it could not be used for direct calibration. However, the physical model showed the same tendencies and could therefore be used to some degree to verify the mathematical model. Some improved design specifications for manholes are proposed based on the results.