Impeller Selection & Design

The Municipal Task

Pumping municipal sewage means to pump

Water + X

And sewage pumps, large and small must be

designed to cope with these „X“ up to a reasonable
limit.
Design Criteria for Sewage Pumps

•X stands for everything, which can enter the sewer

•X can be things, which can pass a toilet

or a gully and which we expect in sewage:
•Faecal, toilet paper
•Grease from Restaurants
•Sand from roads

•X can also be things which can pass a toilet or gully,

but which we should not expect in a municipal sewer:
•Textiles
•Paper
•Plastic articles
•…
Limits of Sewage Pumps

There may also be things in sewage, which we

cannot expect, also if all the water has to pass a
toilet or a gully:
•Big amounts of sand from construction areas
•Trash from farms, markets, small industry, etc
In these cases the responsibles have to
investigate and probably to educate!

If the sewer is broken or e.g. gully grills are removed,

we have to face probably:
•Briggs and stones
•Lockwood
•Dogs, cats, …
•Cars, bicycles, furniture, tyres, …
Here the system has to be improved and
pumping stations and equipment have to be
protected, e.g. by screens
 Design of Pumps for Municipal Sewage
The large pumps
 Motors with high kilowatt rating
 Long running hours
 Large hydraulics
Importance of Design Criteria:
 Motors with good efficiency (costs of motor)
 Hydraulics with good efficiency (classical
optimization)
 Resistance against blockage (easy to
achieve, as large flow means large passage, multi-
vane, high power)
 Design of Pumps for Municipal Sewage
The small pumps
 Motors with low kilowatt rating (90% of all
sewage pumps in Europe have 1.5 to 7.5kW)
 A few running hours (typically in Europe 1000
hours per year)
 Small hydraulics (80 to 150 mm)

Importance of Design Criteria:

 Resistance against blockage (not easy to
achieve, as pumps are small and power is low)
 Hydraulics with reasonable efficiency
(not easy, as blockage resistance needs low number of
impeller vanes and special design)
 Motors efficiency (not so important, as low
running hours and low kilowatts)
Impellers For Sewage Pumping

Q [l/s]
 Impellers For Sewage Pumping
For small and medium sized pumps
Vortex Impellers
Very good resistance against blockage
Low wear by abrasives
Very low efficiency
Small to reasonable solids passage
Open channel impellers
ContraBlock®
Very good resistance against blockage
Medium wear by abrasives
Reasonably good efficiency
Large solids passage
The compromise
Closed channel impellers
Insufficient resistance against blockage
High wear by abrasives
Good efficiency
Small solids passage
 Impellers For Sewage Pumping
The old way of design and optimization
First trial
Design
Pattern making
Casting
Machining
Hydraulic test
Blockage test
First optimization
Pattern modification
Casting
Machining
Hydraulic test
Blockage test
….
CFD Simulation of Sewage pumps

STRATEGY
The strategy adopted is the combination
of the Design of Experiments method
(DOE) with Numerical Simulation (CFD).
• Design of Experiments is a numerical
regression method. It allows efficient
analysis of multiple design parameters.
In this case, factors critical to blockage
performance were selected.
• Full transient numerical simulations are
carried out in CFX-5. Unsteadiness in
the flow is exaggerated by the single
blade impeller, thus inducing inaccuracy
in the less computationally expensive
steady state analysis.
CFD Simulation of Sewage pumps

Pump head vs. impeller position

Hybride Meshing
Impeller prototyped directly from 3D-CAD
Systems
Impeller prototyped directly from 3D-CAD
Systems
Contrablock Patent

United States Patent No. 3,447,475

Titel: Centrifugal Pump
Registration: Jan 9, 1967
Patent filed: June 3, 1969
Inventor: Albert Blum
The oldest Leaflet including Contrablock:
1966
ContraBlock®
Tested - tested - tested - ...

 R&D tests
– according to ABS Works Standard
– documentation by Video

 Field tests
– in selected places around the world
• municipalities
• hotels
• jails, ...
ContraBlock® Clogging Test
ContraBlock® Clogging Test
ContraBlock® Clogging Test
ContraBlock® Clogging Test
ContraBlock® Clogging Test