Among the posh Dublin suburb estates of Foxrock, sits a beautiful manor house. The owners of this estate were in the process of renovating their more than a century old mansion. Included in the restoration was the replacement of a root infested sewer lateral.

The lateral spanned a distance of 85 meters and passed through three manholes. The owners, wishing to preserve their beautifully landscaped grounds, required that little to no excavation take place.

Dunnes Drilling of Dundalk, Ireland was subcontracted to replace the 150 mm clay lateral. Dunnes Drilling has pipe bursting experience with static rod machines. However, because of a bend in the lateral they were concerned about pushing rod through the deteriorated clay pipe.

Pat Dunne, owner of Dunnes Drilling remembered seeing a cable static pipe bursting system at a trade show in the United Kingdom. He contacted Kevin Burt of B-Trac and arranged to hire a PortaBurst® PB30 to do the job.

On the day of the burst, while the prep work was completed by the main contractor, Pat's crew threaded the cable down the existing line and set up the Hammerhead® PortaBurst® PB30. The set up locations were in very tight restricted areas, but this was not a problem because of the compact design of the PortaBurst PB30 system.

One challenge still remained for Dunnes Drilling. The PortaBurst PB30 is designed for sewer lateral work from 110 mm to 160 mm across distances of 50 meters or less. This burst was going to be nearly twice this length. They decided to press on and attempt the burst.

The burst began in the early afternoon. The first 60 meters were burst at a rate of 1.2 meters per minute. The burst head continued to travel at this rate under the manicured grassy area of the landscaping until it reached a large population of mature trees and the soil conditions changed from an irrigated soil to rock hard cobble and clay. The pressure increased on the system, but production was still being made. The burst continued at a slower rate until the pressure reached maximum and production stopped just 5 meters short of the exit pit. The last 5 meters were trenched and the job was completed.

Pat Dunne was impressed with the performance of the PortaBurst® PB30 system. “Now that I have seen it work, I will definitely bear it in mind for other jobs.” said Dunne, “We always work in situations where access is very restricted. The fact that it is so portable and runs off almost any hydraulic power source is a great benefit.”

At the end of the day, the new lateral was in the ground and the owner's wish to preserve the grounds had been granted.