Monitoring a real service line under user activity

The present study is aimed at characterizing a real service line subjected to users’ activity. The minor system considered serves a holiday home in a seaside resort on the Adriatic coast, in northern Italy. The household service line was monitored by acquiring pressure sampled at a frequency of 500 Hz. Two experimental campaigns were executed: in a winter period when no people were living in the holiday home nor in nearby houses, and in a summer period during which both the selected holiday home and nearby houses were inhabited. In the first campaign, transients were generated by manoeuvring single devices within the plumbing system of the house (mixer taps, knob taps and toilet flushes), and pressure signals were acquired just during these manoeuvers. The aim of these tests was to characterize the effects of each single device manoeuver, in pressure terms. In the second campaign, pressure signals were acquired in continuous for more than one week. The analyses of the collected data highlighted that the service line is subjected to pressure variations which can be very significant and depend on the type and position of the operated devices within the plumbing system of the house, as observed in the first campaign, and also of the nearby users, as observed in the second campaign.