Performance-Based Testing of Trenchless Pipeline Rehabilitation

Aging cast- and wrought-iron distribution mains continue to operate beneath traffic-laden, construction-dense corridors, prompting utilities to adopt internal-replacement pipe (IRP) liners as a trenchless rehabilitation option. This paper combines three complementary investigations, a beam-on-springs finite-element (FE) study that translates traffic, adjacent excavation, and thermal loads into joint rotations and crack openings while explicitly accounting for liner stiffness; an independent analytical verification that reconciles those envelopes with prior numerical and field observations; and a full-scale laboratory program that subjects pressurized, rehabilitated specimens to the modeled displacements to establish a performance-based qualification framework for IRP systems. Comparison across the datasets shows that incorporating liner stiffness in the FE models consistently reduces predicted rotations and crack openings relative to approaches that neglect the liner contribution, and that the moderated demands align with the deformation limits at which laboratory specimens begin to lose stiffness or exhibit debonding. The integrated results yield deformation targets and test protocols that translate field-scale predictions into repeatable laboratory loads.