Steve Vick International were asked by Anglian Water to demonstrate their Hexi Pipe Coil Trailer. The Hexi trailer was first identified by one of Anglian Water’s engineers, Lee Forster, with a view to improving the quality of their plant and equipment but also, more importantly the health and safety of their operatives and the communities where their works take place.
The Hexi trailer was initially demonstrated by Tom Vick and Shelley Butler, on a live site, to a highly experienced team within Anglian Water. The team particularly liked the trailer for its’ health and safety attributes. They were impressed that the brakes had to be locked on before any other element can be altered and that by jacking up the pipe inside the trailer, to a point whereby it is dispensed slightly downhill directly from the carousel, instead of being dragged over a set of rollers, makes dispensing effortless and eliminates the need for uncontrolled operative intervention.
Following a successful demonstration, Gary Jackson, Senior Delivery Agent IMR Water, commented:
“After using the Steve Vick Hexi Trailer, the team expressed to me, that moving forward, wherever we are installing up to 125mm pipe by directional drilling or insertion, they would be far happier to use the Hexi Trailer than anything else. It became quickly apparent to the team that the Hexi trailer has been designed and engineered with the optimum safety of the operator in mind. The simple things such as hydraulically raising and lowering the retaining bars and the safe access to remove the bands means that this trailer is much safer than the alternatives, and a step forward in improving how we dispense pipe on trenchless installations.”
Another significant benefit of the Hexi Trailer is that it offers a safe way to transport and store coiled PE, which helps to reduce pipe wastage. By using 500m coils for example, useful lengths can be left on the trailer for the next job. This has been proven to reduce pipe wastage by up to 20%*
The Hexi Trailer, part of a range of trailers at SVI, can handle coils of PE from 40mm up to 125mm. As an example it can accommodate a 500m metre coil of up to 90mm or a 100m coil of up to 125mm PE.
*The wastage of PE pipe is caused by left over lengths from 100 metre or 120 metre coils being too short for most insertion purposes. Using 500 metre coils, however, leaves useful lengths. The calculations were carried out by the Department of Energy & Climate Change on behalf of WWU. Factors taken into consideration included a reduction in pipe wastage, less fittings required, less excavations, less backfill, less reinstatement and less transportation per project.
