AFT Partners with Softdesk CS of Poland

Applied Flow Technology (AFT) would like to welcome Softdesk Centrum Systems (CS) to their international family of Channel Partners.

Based in Lodz, Poland, Softdesk CS provides consulting services and will utilize AFT software solutions to enhance industrial engineering, infrastructure, and business.

Softdesk CS partnered with AFT because of their strong international recognition to quickly and accurately execute flow analysis models as well as mitigate waterhammer / surge issues. While the two companies have known each other for several years, they formed a mutual understanding while attending the ASME PVP conference where AFT President, Trey Walters, P.E., presented several papers on waterhammer / surge.

Softdesk CS appreciates the strong partnership tools AFT can provide their clients. Since 1997, they have provided modern business resources so engineers can confidently work with the most advanced tools to meet project needs. Additionally, Softdesk CS designs industrial piping and performs other specialty services. They work hand-in-hand with major operators of industrial and design companies to pay special attention to issues such as dynamic pulse pressure, vibration and other typical and atypical phenomena in plants.

One of their main priorities is the reduction of pulsation of pressure and mechanical vibrations and accompanying negative environmental effects (noise and other effects vibroacoustic, energy losses, etc.) in installations for extracting, processing and transporting fluids using anti-pumping bottles and other proprietary solutions.

To speak with Softdesk CS or for more information, call +48 509 703 110 or email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

Top 10 Features to Look For in a Flow Analysis Software

If you or your kids are gamers, chances are you have a serious preference on the console you think is best. Right now it’s a fierce rivalry between PlayStation and Xbox with Switch coming in a strong third (or for some it’s first). Either way, they perform differently, have different games, different graphics, and different price tags.

Just like you wouldn’t make an impulsive console purchase, you wouldn’t make a hasty hydraulic flow software purchase. After all, it is a big investment and it’s a tool you will most likely use for a very long time. And just like consoles, there are a few top runner hydraulic flow analysis software companies.

You might think they sound similar and can do the same thing right? Completely wrong. Each offers different features and each has its own level of usability. Many companies have an impressive list of features, but they may not work as expected. That’s why it’s important to take the time to test drive the software.

So how do you decide which hydraulic flow analysis tool is the right tool for you?

How to Evaluate Before Purchasing

First Step: Request a Live Demonstration: Most hydraulic flow companies have a small demo on their website like AFT does. However, it is important to know that this limited demo will absolutely NOT show you what you are looking for. I can’t speak for all companies, but AFT software has so many features and capabilities that is it 100% impossible to throw a demo at an engineer and expect them to automatically understand how to use it.

Therefore, it’s highly recommended that your first step be a live demo where the company can show you the features. This time also gives you the opportunity to dive in and really ask questions on how the software can meet your project needs.

Second Step: Utilize a Free Evaluation License: If you take this step, it’s a really big step. This means you are committing to installing a full version of the software and allocating a few hours to testing it out. AFT provides customers sample files they can play with. But take full advantage of this opportunity! Upload your own neutral file, .pcf files, EPANET files or excel data to kickstart models. Test the add-on modules and run your scenarios. Use pump sizing features and compare your data to other software models and even your hand calculations. This is your time to truly evaluate the features and the usability.

Third Step: How to Communicate the Budget: For many companies, the engineer testing the software needs to communicate with others prior to a purchase. This is the step where you will bring all the players into one room and have a final call with your software consultant. You can explain what you like about it, how you can use it, and your consultant will give a broader demonstration to show extended capabilities and will explain the efficiency benefits – both for man-hours and project accuracy.

What to Look For in a Hydraulic Flow Software

While you are taking the vital steps to evaluate a software, you should keep your end-goals in mind and really think about the features you will need to complete projects you work on. If there are specific features you need, like GIS importing, be sure to compare your prospective products to see how that specific feature works in both software products and evaluate the results it gives you.

Below are the top 10 features AFT encourages our customers to look at:

1. Multiple Levels of Software Calculation Validation
   • This can include model comparisons to published examples, an official quality assurance program such as one that adheres to ASME NQA-1 standards for use in safety-related systems in the nuclear industry, and plenty of case studies.
2. Scenario Management
   • An ability to model any variety of cases within a single model file where you can change any input parameter or fluid properties to determine their effect on results. A “family-tree” like scenario structure is very effective where changes in parent cases should automatically update dependent child cases.
3. Global Editing
   • Efficiency is important. The ability to massively edit multiple pieces of information at the same time is key.
4. Excel Integration
   • Importing model changes to multiple scenarios simultaneously makes updating different cases with data variances incredibly effective. Sending specific model output results to a spreadsheet format in an automated fashion leads to significant flexibility when carrying out other calculations.
5. Design Alerts for Maintaining Code Compliance
   • Quickly bring attention to when important parameters are outside their maximum or minimum allowable boundaries.
6. Heat Transfer
   • Full piping heat transfer calculations should be included to handle convection, buried pipes, layers of insulation, and the ability to calculate external heat transfer coefficients based upon ambient temperatures and wind speeds. Heat transfer through heat exchangers is necessary as is the ability to perform the proper energy balances to determine the mixture temperature when two different streams mix together.
7. Goal Seeking and Transient Modeling
   • Goal seeking saves great amounts of time by automatically changing multiple input parameters to provide you the results you want. This also aids with model calibration to measured data.
   • Transient modeling is important to consider because systems rarely stay the same over time and it is necessary to determine the overall dynamics of a system and how multiple components interact with each other as things change. Simply running multiple cases as a series of steady-state runs would be cause for missing potentially important or problematic intermediate results.
8. Non-Newtonian and Slurry Modeling
   • A quality flow analysis software should be able to handle not only a wide variety of fluids other than water but should have the ability to handle other types of behavior such as paper stocks, Power Law fluids, Bingham Plastics, or settling slurries.
9. System Cost Analysis
   • Accounting for the material, installation, maintenance, and energy costs for an entire piping system in an easy-to-read cost report can be just as important as determining the system flow, pressure, and temperature distributions.
10. Waterhammer Analysis
    • Waterhammer situations can lead to disastrous effects upon sudden pressure surges. A quality flow analysis software should have the ability to determine the system pressure response due to various causes like pump trips, valve closures, pump starts, and include the ability to use surge suppression equipment as well.

If you would like to look further into any of the above features, contact AFT at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or call (719) 686-1000. We look forward to meeting you. 

AFT Impulse 7 – Visualize More for Faster Solutions

Applied Flow Technology Releases New Version of Their Waterhammer and Surge Analysis Software

Bordeaux, France - November 14, 2018 – Applied Flow Technology President, Trey Walters, P.E., announced the release of AFT Impulse™ 7 to help engineers visualize more at the prestigious Pressure Surge Conference in Bordeaux, France where AFT joins top authorities to discuss global advancements on waterhammer and surge.

Quickly approaching its 25^th anniversary, Applied Flow Technology (AFT) has significantly advanced the powerful interface of AFT Impulse 7. While dedicated users still have access to the features which have made AFT Impulse an industry leading software, AFT has invested a great deal into making AFT Impulse 7 a stronger and more advanced tool; a tool mechanical engineers around the world use to design safe and dependable piping systems.

 “Our new version 7 of AFT Impulse clearly demonstrates AFT’s commitment to the global waterhammer engineering community and improving safety in design and operation of piping systems,” said Walters. “We listened to engineers and looked at industry trends. We have made many user interface enhancements to better support both new and experienced users, as well as added several new file import and export formats to make it easier than ever to get existing data into and out of AFT Impulse.”

 In total there are almost 50 new and enhanced features in AFT Impulse 7.

 Here are the top 7 features you will not want to miss out on:

1. Model efficiently with layout import from file formats supported by CAESAR II®, SmartPlant®, CADWorx® and AutoCAD Plant 3D, and import / export EPANET
2. Create models using an isometric grid
3. Utilize color animation to visualize parameter changes over time
4. Improved user interface for defining centrifugal and positive displacement pump data in the Pump Property window using automatic periodic PD pump flow calculation
5. Extensive new Excel capabilities including the ability to export output using the new Excel Export Manager and even complete your exports while running batch scenarios
6. Calculate buried pipe wave speed
7. Ability to model Pumps as Turbines (PAT)

 Find the complete list of new features and information about AFT Impulse at: www.aft.com/products/impulse/details

Import Piping Layouts

Throughout 2018, AFT has released new versions of all of their primary products including AFT Fathom 10, AFT Arrow 7, and now AFT Impulse 7. These releases have each incorporated advanced features with a primary focus of integrated import / export partnerships between software files. All AFT applications allow users to import piping layouts from CAESAR II® Neutral files. The CII Neutral file is a de facto standard in many sectors of industry. You can also import Piping Component Files (*.pcf). This format is supported by SmartPlant®, CADWorx® and AutoCAD Plant 3D, among others. All of this is in addition to the previous capability to import GIS shape files.

In the water industry, a common file format is EPANET.  AFT applications will import and export EPANET files.

Software Extension Tools

AFT users will tell you the software is great on its own; but when they add-on a module, the software becomes a tool that surpasses their expectation of what AFT software can do.

AFT Impulse has two add-on module options: Settling Slurry Module and the Pulsation Frequency Analysis Module.

 Settling Slurry (SSL) Module is the only commercial software solution that can model both non-settling and settling slurry waterhammer effects. With this tool, engineers can predict slurry wavespeed and keep a wide range of slurry data in a sharable database. Users can specify if it is a basic water slurry which uses water as the carrier fluid and treats all pipes as isothermal; or an advanced slurry that uses any fluid as the carrier fluid, allows slurry properties to vary among pipes, and allows heat transfer and system energy balance calculation. Engineers even have their choice of calculation methods: minimal, simplified, or detailed.

 AFT entered into the pulsation realm with the Pulsation Frequency Analysis (PFA) Module. Why? Because pulsation issues are difficult to diagnose and can cause significant operational problems. Mitigation of pulsation issues can lead to a large amount of wasted productivity in terms of both employee time and lower product delivery. AFT developed the PFA Module so engineers can keep pulsation identification and mitigation in-house and quickly evaluate possible solutions better than ever before. All of this while ensuring compliance with API 674!

AFT Impulse Product Quick Facts:

AFT Impulse is a powerful dynamic simulation and analysis tool used to calculate pressure surge transients in liquid piping systems caused by waterhammer. 

• Easily model a wide range of system components and surge devices
• Understand the transient response of your system, knowing how valves, pumps and other components will dynamically interact with each other.
• Evaluate the effect of pressure surges due to vapor cavity collapse by modeling vapor cavitation and liquid column separation.
• Validate the design of safety features to produce safer, more economical pipe systems.

About Applied Flow Technology

About to celebrate their 25^th anniversary, Applied Flow Technology is a leader in the pipe flow modeling software market. With a primary focus on developing high quality fluid flow analysis software, AFT has a comprehensive line of products for the analysis and design of piping and ducting systems.

With channel partners around the world and customers in more than 80 countries, AFT software has helped companies in many industries design safer, more efficient systems and solve operational problems.

Located in Colorado Springs, Colorado, USA, our professional staff consists of engineers with extensive experience in both the design and construction of piping systems and the development of analytical modeling methods.

View the extended details of AFT Impulse at: http://www.aft.com/products/impulse/details

AFT to Present at Prestigious Pressure Surges Conference

Applied Flow Technology's (AFT) very own Trey Walters, P.E. and Purple Mountain Technical Group's (PMTG), Dylan Witte, will join approximately one-hundred of the world's leaders in Bordeaux, France this November for the 2018 Pressure Surges Conference. 

According to the BHR Group, The Pressure Surges conference series has been running since 1972, with forerunners in 1971 and 1970. It is the leading conference in the world which aims to bring together practical engineers and theoretical academics, young and old, inexperienced and specialist, from all over the world. It provides updates on the latest developments in modeling, simulating and validating pressure surges and focuses on the topics of Big Transient Data and Small Smart Sensors. 

The 13th conference will embrace both traditional and novel subjects. Industrial papers will present case studies, each telling its own story. Research papers will give updates on the latest developments in modeling, simulating and validating pressure surges. Dedicated Forum papers will stimulate audience interaction with presenters and will complement other discussion and debate sessions dedicated to interactive participation.

The five papers AFT and PMTG will present showcase AFT's partnerships with world-renowned companies as well as a specialized software analysis tool used by these companies called AFT Impulse™. 

Over 20 years ago when Applied Flow Technology created AFT Impulse ™, they knew it would be a leader in the tools researchers and industries around the world would use to provide advanced solutions and solve waterhammer / surge issues. AFT Impulse brings confidence to the table. It has been matched against several other pieces of software and methods. Time and time again it provides reliable analysis data and helps engineers troubleshoot events and proactively build safe piping systems.

In addition to being used and trusted by thousands of engineers who specialize in transient events, the majority of AFT products are validated and verified for nuclear engineering use. Because of this verification and validation, AFT Impulse has been utilized in nuclear plants around the world. 

Applied Flow Technology will present four papers and Purple Mountain Technical Group will present one paper. Papers include: 

Making the world a safer and better place – a plea for more data, validation cases and guidelines for waterhammer simulation

T W Walters, Applied Flow Technology, USA | G G Orieux, Q Li, L Thomson, Enbridge Pipelines Inc, Canada

Engineers tend to overdesign systems when uncertainty exists. Overdesign is an important part of the engineering process, but unnecessary overdesign will only increase the cost of systems without enhancing safety. An experience between a major pipeline company,  their engineering design firm, and the waterhammer simulation software products used by both is described. A disagreement between software package results and ultimately the two companies developed into an issue that could significantly increase costs. More and better validation cases would have helped everyone navigate this situation more quickly, easily and inexpensively. More and better application guidelines may have helped the engineering design firm achieve higher certainty in their recommendations with potentially less overdesign.

Unappreciated challenges in applying four quadrant pump data to waterhammer simulation

T W Walters, S A Lang, D O Miller, Applied Flow Technology, USA

Part 1: Fundamentals
The transient analysis of reverse flow and rotation in pumps has evolved over the years into modern four quadrant pump waterhammer simulation. Exact characteristics for a given pump for reverse flow and/or reverse rotation are normally unavailable, and manufacturer curves are often mapped to previously published four quadrant data sets for similar pumps. Assumptions made in this mapping process can cause extreme differences in the simulation. If these assumptions are unaddressed, critically incorrect conclusions about the system’s transient behavior may be made, impacting both design and operation.
The available choices to the waterhammer analyst and the consequences of those choices are thoroughly detailed in Part 1 of this paper.

Part 2: Application Examples
Transient analysis of reverse flow and rotation in pumps requires the use of four quadrant data. This data is normally unavailable for a given pump, and existing dimensionless four quadrant data is selected based on specific speed. There are different methods for dimensionalizing the four quadrant data, which can result in significant differences in transient predictions. This study examines four examples with three exhibiting reverse flow. The two most convenient methods of dimensionalizing four quadrant data are used, and significant differences in transient predictions are demonstrated and discussed.

Surge transients due to check valve closure in a municipal water pumping station

D Lozano Solé 1, R Bosch Segarra 1, and T W Walters 2  | (1) Aquatec Proyectos para el Sector del Agua SAU (SUEZ Group), Spain  | (2) Applied Flow Technology, USA

The present study highlights the importance of proper check valve selection to mitigate waterhammer and its associated problems. Two different check valves were installed in a pumping station in a municipal water transfer system: a swing check valve and a nozzle check valve. Measurements were taken of pipeline pressures after a pump trip and resulting check valve closure. The field data was compared to predictions from a model using a commercial waterhammer tool. Commonly accepted methods for estimating reverse liquid velocity at check valve closure were utilized. Results were also compared to previous experimental test from other authors. The calibrated model results matched the field data quite well. Comparisons of inferred valve characteristics to previously published results for swing and nozzle valves were not in close agreement for either tested valve.

Surge mitigation in a marine fuel oil terminal

D Witte 1; D Jackson 2; T W Walters 3  | (1) Purple Mountain Technology Group, USA | (2) Sealaska, USA | (3) Applied Flow Technology, USA

Surge modeling of complex systems such as marine fuel oil terminals requires the use of accurate computer modeling techniques to help insure the best possible response to surge events. Various surge mitigation techniques can be pursued that often require information that manufactures rarely provide and have behavior that is problematic to replicate in a computer model. This paper provides guidance with one such device, the surge relief valve, and offers a case study in how they were used in conjunction with valve stroking to mitigate significant surge events at a terminal in the gulf coast region of the United States.

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