Precast Concrete Box Culverts
Precast Concrete Box Culverts are easily installed and therefore serve as conduits for enclosing small roads, pathways, or flowing water such as streams, stormwater, or drains, especially when these pass beneath roads, railways, or embankments.
Shay Murtagh Precast is one of the largest producers of precast concrete box culverts in the UK and Ireland. With our modern and mechanised box culvert production facilities, we can produce over 60 metres of culvert section per day. We manufacture a range of standard stock size box culverts but most units we design and manufacture to meet individual project specifications. This allows us complete flexibility and enables us to manufacture box culverts that can accommodate any situation.
Jointing
Rebated joints prevent a vertical drop at the interface between adjacent precast units. At the same time, they allow potential differential settlement without introducing unwanted load effects in the culverts. Shay Murtagh Precast developed a sealed joint detail.
Wingwalls & Headwalls & Mammal Ledges
Shay Murtagh Precast also manufactures, as standard, the precast wingwalls and headwalls used at the ends of the culvert run. This ensures effective flow into and out of the culvert and retains the embankments associated with the same.
Wingwalls function as precast concrete retaining walls placed at the culvert entrance and exit. The tops of the walls slope to match the embankment contours. Wing walls help to form and protect the ends of the culvert. In addition, wingwalls protect the ends of the culvert. Shay Murtagh Precast designs and manufactures them to meet site conditions, loading requirements, and ground stability..
Headwalls, or head beams, sit between wingwalls at the culvert ends and attach directly to the top slab. They retain soil above the culvert while securing the culvert entrance and exit. Serve to retain any soil above the culvert at the very end of the culvert run in order to form and protect the culvert entrance and exit. Headwalls often also serve as a more suitable attachment for safety fencing and handrails.
Shay Murtagh Precast can include mammal ledges where required within the manufacturing process for box culverts. The flexibility in our design and manufacturing process allows us to comfortably accommodate almost any additional concrete components or required provision of openings within the standard culvert section.
Design Service
Our in-house team of highly experienced engineers and technicians deliver a top-quality design and detailing service that is both thorough and flexible. Detailed designs, carried out in-house for each individual project. This allows us optimal flexibility with regards to job-specific constraints and conditions while enabling us to optimize the detailed design and produce the corresponding drawings and details rapidly.
Shay Murtagh Precast Concrete Box Culverts are typically designed & detailed in full compliance with
- EN 1992-1-1,
- EN 1992-2,
- EN 1991-1-1,
- EN 1991-2,
- EN 1990
- EN 1997-1
- the relevant National Annexes for the said Eurocodes,
- PD 6694-1,
- BS 8500-1 and
- BS 14844:2006+A1:2008.
Where required, we can design and detail culverts to the old British Standard in force prior to the adaption of the Eurocodes. In fact, the range of experience, technical capability and flexibility of our design team enables Shay Murtagh Precast to comply with any required standard or specification.
Variations on Precast Box Culverts
Shay Murtagh frequently manufactures several other types of precast culverts beyond the common box culvert cross section. Large box culverts too big for single-unit transport use two U-sections. Workers assemble these sections on-site with a ball-and-socket joint connecting the halves into a finished box section. Referred to as UAN culverts.
We also supply three-sided U-sections if the project specifies access from above. The U-section, left permanently open or supplied with a separate precast lid placed on top of the walls of the U-section. Similarly, we design and manufacture three-sided portal frames in situations where a bottom slab, prohibited or deemed an economic disadvantage. These include both single unit portal frames for shallower crossings and portal frames placed on precast base legs (referred to as jointed portal frames) for culverts spanning over railway or other crossings with high clearance requirements.
Shay Murtagh also has the capability to design and manufacture double cell box culverts.
We can manufacture skewed and splayed culvert units where required.
Finally, we have developed standard details including closing walls that allow our culverts for use as attenuation tanks.
Box Culverts FAQ
What is a Concrete Box Culvert?
A culvert is a conduit used to enclose a flowing body of water. It may be used to allow water to pass underneath a road, railway, or embankment. Precast Concrete Box Culverts are quick and easy to install and are mainly used for drainage and underpasses.
What is a Concrete Wing Wall?
Attachment of wingwalls to structural elements like bridges or building foundations is essential. Like a retaining wall, a wing wall holds back the soil on one side, facilitating a change in elevation.
Sloping sites often incorporate wing walls into their building foundations. The wing walls, built as extensions of the building foundation on the downhill side of the structure. They hold back the soil to create open lawn area outside a walkout basement providing additional yardage to a home or building.
Bridge wing walls are a little different than building wing walls in that there are usually four – a pair at each end – extending at an angle from the ends of the bridge. The four wing walls of a bridge are essential parts of the bridge foundation.
When the bridge spans a waterway, the wing walls protect the roadway on either side of the bridge from erosion by directing water under the span.
What are Culverts used for?
The uses for pre-cast concrete box culverts are endless. They can be used for underpasses, service tunnels, subways, outfalls, bridges, passageways for animals, stream culverts, material handling, utility storage, chimneys, vertical storage, watertight holding tanks and more.
Benefits of using Concrete Pipes?
Firstly, a concrete pipe known for extreme durability. Much more durable that any other kind of pipe and it can carry more load at a single time. Secondly, concrete pipes are thermal and weather resistant.
What size Culverts are Available?
A range of sizes are available from 1.0m x 1.0m to 14.0m x 7.0m. The larger Culverts are made in U – sections and delivered in two pieces to site. Bespoke sizes created by specialist concrete engineers. Wing Walls and Header Beams can also be provided.
Box Culvert Technical Manual
This is the First Edition of our Box Culvert Technical Manual. The manual is intended to illustrate the variety of applications and significant benefits of using precast concrete box culverts and provides an overview of their structural design and detailing
Box Culvert Case Studies
Recent Box Culverts Blogs
We are proud to have worked on some of the biggest infrastructure projects in Ireland and the UK.
Our qualified design team work with major contractors to develop value engineering solutions.
Standard Culverts Design Gallery
Bespoke Box Culverts Design Gallery
