Grit Chambers:

•Grits are composed of sand, small gravel, broken glass or other heavy solid material present in
the wastewater.
•Grits are predominantly inert dry solids, heavier than water.
•As these materials have greater subsiding velocities or specific gravity, they are separated or
removed from the wastewater by gravity settling.
Therefore, Grit chambers are sedimentation basins or settling basins designed mainly to remove
heavier or coarse inert and dry suspended solids from the wastewater.
Types of Grit Chambers:
•Rectangular Horizontal Flow type : is the most commonly used type of grit chamber in which
organic matters are not allowed to settle down with proper velocity control. They are normally
designed to remove the particles of about 0.2 mm size or more. The length of channel is normally
governed by the depth required for specific settling velocity (critical velocity), and the type of
velocity control device used. The cross sectional area is governed by the flow through velocity
and the number of channels provided.
•Detritus tanks: is a normally square type of grit chamber in which some amount of organic
matter and fine suspended solids present in wastewater is allowed to settle down along with grit
by controlling the flow through velocity.
•Aerated grit chamber: also known as aerated detritus tank. In this type of grit chamber, the
organic solids that would otherwise settle down by gravity is kept in suspension by rising air
bubbles of aeration system provided at the bottom of tank or by means of some type of agitation.
•Square Horizontal flow type: This type of grit chambers were employed earlier to remove
particles of size 0.15 mm and above.
•Vortex flow type: In this type of grit chamber, the devices that produce vortex flow of
wastewater in the tank are used to remove the grit.