Economical gas connection using Viega press technology
When house builders decide on natural gas for heating, the installation of the house service connection comes to the foreground as a significant cost factor. The public utility of the town of Hamelin in northern Germany has been able to achieve a considerable reduction in these costs by the use of the press systems Geopress and Geopress K.
The burghers of Hamelin have always been innovative and cost-conscious. As early as 1861, the town on the banks of the river Weser supplemented its conventional oil street lamps with 27 high-tech gas lanterns. They were supplied with gas via subterranean pipelines.
Those responsible have kept a discerning eye on technological progress ever since. For instance in 2008, when they discovered Viega's newly developed press connecting technology Geopress for below-ground plastic pipelines. They subjected the new gunmetal press connectors to rigorous testing for a whole year. The field trials on sample sites showed: Laying below-ground PE-pipes using press connectors can be done more than twice as fast than with conventional welding.
These factors especially made the difference:
• In contrast to welding, pressing the pipe and the connector takes only seconds.
• In contrast to welding, the connecting can be done in bad weather such as rain and snow as well.
• Residual water in the pipelines does not play a role.
• There are no warming-up and cooling-down times as are needed for welding.
• There is no need for an electrical power supply for the welding gear.
In addition, Viega now also supplies press connectors of highly durable plastic for below-ground drinking water and gas supply lines – the Geopress K system. The experts from the Hamelin public utilities also carefully appraised this innovative connection technology – and came to the same positive conclusions.
The most important safety element in the Geopress K system is the extensive inner seal of the plastic connectors on a support body that requires no O-rings. This means that the ends of the pipes do not need to be either deburred or chamfered. Even external grooves make no difference.