General Method for Pullback Force Estimation for Polyethylene Pipes in Horizontal Directional Drilling

AbstractThis paper proposes a general method for estimating pullback force applied on polyethylene (PE) pipes during horizontal directional drilling (HDD) installations based on adapting the Capstan equation to a PE pipe negotiating a curved bore. Compared to current standards, this method can be implemented in any installation regardless of the bore geometry, such as ground surface grade or number of segments composing the bore path. To verify the proposed method, pullback data collected from an HDD installation project is compared to forces estimated by the proposed method as well as standard methods. This paper demonstrates the proposed method’s ability in estimating a more-accurate pullback load.