REU 1999 – Pressurized Pipe Modeling

Undeerground pressurized pipe leak detecting can be done when a closed pipe is idle by using a single pressure sensor to observe the pressure decay caused by a leak. But pressure changes caused by inital temperature conditions driving thermal flow can either mask a leak or cause false alarms. The project proposes to develop mathematical models to accurately described thermal and leak induced pressure versus time data so that leaks can be distinguished from thermal interference.