Case Study 02.2023

High-Pressure Fresh-Water
Booster Station Improves
Water Reliability for
Lincoln County, North
Carolina Residents
Lincoln County’s new high-pressure booster station, operating at 225 psi,maintains fresh-water pressure throughout an eight-mile pipeline while
gaining to 220 feet of vertical elevation. The plug-and-play booster station,
manufactured by Gorman-Rupp, not only provides reliable water service to thecounty’s western Piedmont residents, it minimized installation time and costs bymatching pumps, motors, controls, valves, pipes and accessories for maximum
compatibility and performance.
The City of Lincolnton draws its water from the South
Located in west-central North
Fork of the Catawba River running just west of the city.
Carolina, Lincoln County has a total
It maintains a separate water treatment plant with acapacity of handling 12 million gallons per day, but
area of 307 square miles and iswith an average usage of 2.5 million gallons per day.
home to more than 86,000 residents.
The City of Lincolnton, the county
Water Distribution Problem inWestern Lincoln County
seat, situated in the center of thecounty, is approximately thirty-seven The biggest technical hurdle for fresh-water
distribution in Lincoln County is topographical. The
miles northwest of Charlotte incounty generally rises in elevation going from east
to west, with the steepest elevation gains in thethe Piedmont region of the state.
The county runs east to west in the shape of a long
rectangle. On the eastern side of the county is Lake
Norman, a nine square-mile man-made reservoir
which supplies fresh water to county homes andbusinesses. The Lincoln County Department of Public
Works treats up to 3.9 million gallons of fresh water
per day and manages its distribution through 310
miles of water lines.

western part of the county.

“The county pumps water from its water treatment
plant near Lake Norman through a series of threebooster pump stations to supply its western county
residents,” said Adam M. Jolicoeur, WTP Superintendent,
Department of Public Works with Lincoln County. “Thelast booster station on the line, just west of Lincolnton,
had to pump to the highest point in the county,

new interconnection from the city’s water supply to thecounty’s to supply redundancy. We proposed tapping
into two 18-inch fresh-water discharge lines comingfrom city’s water treatment plant and putting thatwater into the county’s distribution system. There werea lot of regulations that had to be considered going
into that decision.”
The challenges of blending water from two water
treatment systems, laying a new pipeline, andpumping uphill eight miles on a dead-end line, were
all parts of this solution needing to be resolved. It
was definitely an interrelated situation.

New Pipeline to the Western County
Gorman-Rupp ReliaSource® pre-packaged
booster stations include precisely matchedpumps, motors, controls and accessories andarrive to the job site ready for immediate hookup to piping and power.
an elevation gain of 220 vertical feet. This booster
station has been adequate to keep water pressure
at a reasonable range, but not without frequent line
interruptions due to breaks in the underground PVC
piping because of the need to maintain water pressure
at 225 psi, triple the normal maximum.”Planning a Solution“Instead of fixing a breaking pipeline, the focus wasto create a secondary water source to service thewestern county residents,” said Paul Smith P.E., SeniorProject Manager at Woolpert, the engineering firm
selected by the county to consult on this project.
“The plan was to access additional water from theCity of Lincolnton’s water treatment system and put
in an additional eight-mile 18” iron pipeline fromtheir plant to the far western side of the county.”
Lincolnton had excess water capacity, so the city
agreed to sell the water to the county. But that was
just the beginning.
“It was unique, and challenging because it is a blendedsystem,” said David Powell PhD, P.E., Senior Civil
Engineer, formerly with Woolpert. “We were building a2

The pipeline was the longest construction
component of the project. It was going from thepoint of lowest elevation at 1,010 feet directly acrossfrom the city’s water treatment plant, running eight
miles uphill to 1,230 feet into a water storage tankat the highest elevation in the western boundary of
the county. Although the new and existing pipelines
are on very different corridors, they are effectively
running parallel.
“Contractors are used to normal pipeline waterpressure of 40 to 80 psi, but this was a very highpressure pipeline,” added Powell. “The contractors
had a much more stringent performance metric –stronger materials and bigger specifications. Cast
iron 350 psi classification pipe material was specified.”

Pre-Manufactured Pressure
Booster Station
A key component of the project was the pressure
booster station. Woolpert engineers grappled withhow big it should be, where to put it, and how muchflow was needed to overcome the challenge of thevery high pressure.
“The county wanted a system that would require afaster start-up, minimal hands-on maintenance, and fit
onto a very tight footprint,” added Smith. “The countyalso required the appearance of the station to beunobtrusive. This led us to consider a pre-manufactured
pressure booster station as a solution and what
advantages it could have over a conventional booster
station for this application.”© 2014 ©
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2023
Gorman-Rupp
Gorman-Rupp
Company
Pumps

Woolpert reached out to Tencarva Municipal, which
provides pumps and associated liquid handlingequipment for municipalities. The company has
worked with Lincoln County on other water andwastewater projects in the past, and the county felt
confident they could access local technicians andparts as needed.
“Effective pressure booster stations operate bestwith valves, controls, pipes and pumps that all work
together to meet the required handling needs,” said
Guy Chapman, Sales Engineer at Tencarva Municipal.
“If any one of these components fails, it can put thebooster station’s operation at risk.
There are a few companies that do pre-manufactured
pressure booster stations,” added Chapman. “One ofthese is Gorman-Rupp Pumps. We have had manysuccessful municipal projects with Gorman-Rupp’s
ReliaSource® stations in the past, including theirabove-ground pressure booster stations.”“Their systems are custom-engineered, manufactured,assembled and tested at Gorman-Rupp’s facilities,”
continued Chapman. “Pumps, motors, valves, pipes,
NEMA-rated controls, enclosures and accessories
are precision-matched and integrated for maximum
compatibility and performance. The stations are readyfor plug-and-play installation on location.”
Based on Woolpert’s specifications and Tencarva’s
recommendations, Gorman-Rupp custom-designed
an above-ground pressure booster station as acomplete system, ready for immediate installationand hookup to power and piping.
“The pump booster station was specified for 675
GPM and 323 feet of total dynamic head,” explained
Powell. “The traditional class of cast iron that is usedin most booster pump stations was not going to beappropriate because it would not be able to holdthe pressure. We needed the high pressure becauseof the distance the water was traveling and theelevation gain.”Consequently, we specified two variable-frequency
drive pumps,” added Powell. “One of the unusual2
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Each pressure booster station is pre-tested
before it leaves the Gorman-Rupp facility toensure it will perform to design conditions when
it is delivered.
aspects of the pump station is that the pumps are fairly
small, but the motors are twice the size of the pumps
to accommodate the head they are pushing against.”
The double-suction pumps are designed for a wide
range of municipal conditions. They are ideal whenpumps must periodically operate at capacities above or
below design capacity or during intermittent high head
conditions. Their dual-volute casing design equalizes
radial forces and lessens radial reaction of shaft andbearings, assuring smooth, vibration-free performance.
“These VFD pumps slowly step up, ideally designedthat way because they are pushing uphill,” explained
Jolicoeur. “The pumps gradually increase because
they are pumping up exceeding 200 psi.”“The entire pump station shipped to the job site
completely assembled and tested from the factory
and was up and fully functional within three weeks
from delivery on the site,” continued Chapman. “Thisminimized the installation effort by the contractor
and made for a smoother and faster installation
which was completed in October 2022.”© 2014 ©
The2023
Gorman-Rupp
Gorman-RuppCompanyPumps“Because of the high pressure, we needed to put asurge tank on both the influent side of the pumpstation and on the effluent side of the pump station,”
said Smith. “Placing a surge tank on one side of abooster station is common, but on both the influent
and effluent sides is unusual. The influent side of thepump station is coming from the city – we couldn’t
risk any surge going back into the city’s systembecause it was not rated for high-pressure – so we had
to have a surge tank on the influent side. We definitelyhad to have a surge tank on the effluent side becauseof the elevation we were pushing against.”

A variety of modular enclosure options areavailable that allow stations to blend into thesurrounding environment. Their overall size
and roll-up access doors provide easy accessto station components for routine operator
maintenance.
“Having a single-source contact for the entire
functionality of the pump station is extremely
important,” explained Chapman. “It provides singlesource system responsibility. If there’s an issue,
Gorman-Rupp engineers fully understand theintegration of the pumps and controls.”
Surrounding the pump booster station is its 11’ x 24’
faux brick facade enclosure designed to attractively
blend in with the surrounding landscaping. The
enclosure resists corrosion, mildew, fungus and mold.
Two-way sliding cover panels provide easy access toall equipment for maintenance or service. Vandalresistant door hardware and padlock-able sliding
covers provide added security.
“As far as booster stations go, this is one of the mostinteresting I’ve ever seen,” added Jolicoeur.

Surge Mitigation
One of the factors to be considered on the highpressure pump station was eliminating pressure
surge in the pipeline.

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The two 2,500-gallon surge tanks are locatedunderground and are separate from the pressure
booster station. In the event that the pumps kickout, the surge tanks ensure the water pressure ismaintained throughout the pipeline, despite theuphill flow of water.

System Controls“Our key reason for specifying a pre-manufactured
station was so we could get it fully tested at thefactory and make sure all the controls were operating
properly,” added Powell. “It still needs field testingwhen it’s on the site, but it was very beneficial to run
it through all the paces before it shipped.”
The booster station is quite far from the county’s water
treatment plant, so it needed to be standalone, reliable,
and capable of making decisions based on remote inputs.
The control system has some very unique features
built into it. Operationally, the pumps are managed
using SCADA. Both the city of Lincolnton and Lincoln
County have separate monitoring control telemetry
installed. The operator enables it and then the VFD
takes over and does its preprogrammed system startup until the pumps get to their operational level.
The booster station controls also had to monitor
the water level. A typical booster pump station
operates on pressure, where the pressure sensor
turns on when the pressure is low, or off when thepressure is high. With this station the water pressure
had to be pulled from SCADA, using both the City of
Lincolnton’s system and the county’s system.

© 2014 ©
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2023
Gorman-Rupp
Gorman-Rupp
CompanyPumps

station’s control system. Ensuring that the station
could operate effectively both with and without thisinformation was of utmost importance. The actual
programming of the control system was done by
Gorman-Rupp under the guidance of Woolpert.

Project Success“We have had multiple events in the years prior withloss of water pressure to our customers in the west
county area,” said Jolicoeur. “Water was shut off tohomes, schools, and businesses. The fire department
had to put out notices – it was quite disruptive. This
project has eliminated that problem completely.”

From left to right: Jonathan Drazenovich,P.E., County Engineer – Lincoln County Public
Utilities, Guy Chapman, Sales Engineer –Tencarva Municipal, Adam Jolicoeur, WTP
Superintendent – Department of Public Works
with Lincoln County, Paul Smith, P.E., Senior
Project Manager – Woolpert & Eric Knudsen,
Northeast District Manager – Gorman-Rupp
Pumps Engineered Systems.
Because readings of water levels were based on
the SCADA system information, not based on local
information, a failsafe timeout mode was necessary
if the system lost power or lost communication.
So, if cell service went down the station would notcontinue pumping out thousands of gallons of water
based on the last known prior communication.
The various SCADAs, VFD inputs, and water
indications were critical factors in designing theAbout Gorman-Rupp Pumps
For more than ninety years Gorman-Rupp Pumps
USA has manufactured pumps for municipal, sewage,industrial, mining, construction, petroleum, OEM,government, agriculture and fire markets.
The company’s extensive line of pump products includes
self-priming centrifugal pumps, standard centrifugal
pumps, submersible pumps, rotary gear pumps,
diaphragm pumps, engine-driven pumps, and priming
assist pumps. In addition, Gorman-Rupp manufactures
a complete line of state-of-the-art packaged lift stations
and booster stations that include pumps, motors,controls, piping, accessories and enclosures.
For more information, contact Cyndi Hoffner,Advertising Manager, Gorman-Rupp Pumps USA; 600
South Airport Road, Mansfield, OH 44903-7831; Phone:419-755-1011; email cyndi.hoffner@gormanrupp.com;
www.grpumps.com.

GORMAN-RUPP PUMPS | P.O. BOX 1217 | MANSFIELD, OHIO 44901-1217 | USA | 419.755.1011 | GRSALES@GORMANRUPP.COM | GRPUMPS.COM25© 2014 ©
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