Welcome to the Applied Flow Technology Blog where you will find the latest news and training on how to use AFT Fathom, AFT Arrow, AFT Impulse, AFT xStream and other AFT software products.
From the very beginning AFT Impulse was a world leader. AFT Impulse was first released in November, 1996 which made it the first visual, drag-and-drop waterhammer modeling software for Microsoft Windows (see below). AFT Impulse 1 in 1996 - the First Graphical Waterhammer Software for Windows Those of you who are familiar with AFT Impulse today a
I often say that all good American companies start in someone's garage or basement. AFT started in the basement of my country home in Louisville, Ohio (see photo below). We ran the company from my basement (with myself and three other employees) until the summer of 1996 - at which point we decided to move the company (and ourselves) to the Colorad
First is because 20 years in business means that AFT software is proven.Second is because of the prizes we are giving away this year. Twenty of them no less!Come along with me while I elaborate on what AFT has achieved in the last 20 years. And explain more about the two P's.A Vision for the VisualThe last 20 years has been a long and exciting jou
You have just finished designing your system and built a model of your system in AFT Fathom and have convinced your team and the client that the system will achieve all the desired pressures, flow rates, and temperatures. The next big question is, “How much will this system cost?” With AFT Fathom, you have the ability to answer that question in g
EU chemical industry on the verge of collapse from Processing Magazine 2013 "The European chemical industry is in grave danger and a large part of it might close down within the next 10 years… The biggest problem is that chemical manufacturing is heavily reliant on energy, and costs are up to three times higher in Europe than they are in the Unite
With the release of AFT Fathom 8 and AFT Impulse 5, there is an incredibly useful new feature available on the Workspace called the "Quick Access Panel". This feature allows you to quickly and easily work with several useful features of the software in one area such as the Scenario Manager, Pipe and Junction Inspection, Workspace Overview Map
Today it is no longer necessary to take short cuts. But all too often we see engineers doing just that. AFT Arrow is AFT's gas flow simulation software and it will be celebrating its 20th anniversary next year. Just last week I had a conversation with an AFT Arrow user from a well known engineering firm who was required by a client to use gas mode
Complex piping networks can often be simplified using two powerful features available in AFT Fathom 8 and AFT Impulse 5. Under the “Pipe Properties” window, the “Fittings and Losses” tab and the “Use Intermediate Elevations” feature on the “Optional” tab allow the user to specify several fittings and elevation changes that otherwise would be input
AFT Arrow 5 was recently released and has several wonderful new features in store! One of the most powerful and largest time saving features is the new glorious “Search”. Located in the toolbar, “Search” allows for the quick locating of Junctions or Pipes much like a search engine finds a website. Where can I find it? “Search” has become a st
Nuclear power has had a bumpy history. In recent years nuclear power has come to be viewed by some as a clean source of power with virtually no CO2 emissions. Different countries view nuclear power in different ways. France obtains over 75% of it's electricity from nuclear power. China is building many new nuclear power plants. New nuclear reactor
AFT Arrow 4.0 and AFT Fathom 7.0 offer the ability to view text output across multiple scenarios simultaneously, greatly facilitating seeing the differences in results between scenarios. To view multiple scenario output, open Output Control either from the Analysis menu or, when the Output window is active, by clicking the toolbar button, and then
You have just received a pump curve from a manufacturer to use in modeling your piping system. However, the pump manufacturer only tested their pump with water while your system fluid has a density that is different than water. These differences need to be accounted for with your flow model as well. This may sound like a bit of a daunting task u
Previously, I wrote an article that discussed how to account for density differences between a pump manufacturer's test fluid and a system fluid for pumps as well as the importance, https://www.aft.com/blog/entry/2014/12/02/reference-densities-for-pump-operation. Both AFT Fathom and AFT Impulse can take into account these density differences
I apologize up front if the snappy title may have misled you, but there will be no discussion about the monetary impact of the world on AFT Software here! Rather, this article will point out some resources to help Users get the most out of their AFT products when our world is in a constant state of flux! One of the main aims of the team of Applicat
Congratulations to all the lucky winners! AFT has a hard earned reputation for excellence in our products and our technical support. For the next 20 years we plan to build on that reputation. Here are some things to keep an eye out for from AFT this year: The release of AFT Fathom 9 with a host of new features The release of AFT Impulse 6 with a
Then, do the same thing for the other heat exchanger (by linking back to the previous heat exchanger). Finally, the model can run and this will allow simulation of two sides of one heat exchanger and their associated flow loops in a single model file!! Figure 7 shows that the heat transfer FROM the hot oil shell side of the heat excha
It is well-known that valve closures and openings can cause waterhammer events. Because this is perhaps the most common cause of surge events, it is important to understand how to input valve transients and characteristics. Regarding both steady state characteristics and transient operations, there are some terms that we should clarify that may be
AFT Software is jam packed with options that allow Users to customize their hydraulic modeling experiences. Of which, are the many ways to use the data tables when viewing text based inputs and conveying results. But sometimes the defaults, for example in AFT Fathom, are not identical to how you elect to report your results. In this blog I will sho
But you can find extra time in other ways that do not depend an calendar adjustments. That time is found by accomplishing your assigned engineering tasks in less time. And that is where AFT software can and does help engineering companies in 70+ countries around the world. Below is a list of the top five ways AFT software saves engineers time: Top
Two summers ago I bought a new home in the Colorado Spring area. It has an air conditioning unit that only distributes air to the upstairs. Upstairs has only bedrooms and a bathroom. Colorado Springs is a beautiful city that sits at the base of the world famous Pikes Peak. The local elevation of the city is 6000 ft (1800 m) and my home is at 7200
Perhaps a good place to start is this video I highly recommend watching - "Guys build amazing 7-mile-long model of the solar system, to scale". As I watched the video it brought back vivid memories of grade school for me. My amazing teachers had the wonderful idea to setup a solar system on the playground where kids held a picture of each planet a
Recently, a customer calculated the mass flow rate of a fluid through an orifice using both the ASME standard MFC-3M-1989 and AFT Arrow. He was puzzled when this mass flow rate calculation differed by approximately 100 lbm/hr between the two methods, so he reached out to AFT for help in determining the reason for the discrepancy. The answer for the
You may be asking yourself why we are advertising our Denver area User Group and first ever AFT Software Workshop in a Tips and Trick blog. Well that answer is quite simple really. As an ongoing effort to make the strongest relationship with our User’s and thus helping us to provide our community, which includes You, with the best tools ever, we ye
One of the newest features of AFT Fathom 9 that will add a lot more efficiency to analyzing your results is the new Design Alert Manager! In addition to the new Design Alert Manager, it is also possible to add general Design Alerts for junctions such as inlet or outlet pressure, or perhaps the pressure loss across a junction. In previous versions
Engineers using AFT hydraulic software (Fathom, Arrow, and Impulse) know that they are utilizing powerful flow modeling tools capable of modeling real fluid behavior in simple and complex piping networks, but many are often unaware that our software also provides a vast array of customization options that can visually aid the user’s understanding o
AFT software products have had powerful graphing capabilities for a very long time. Many types of graphs can be created with AFT products such as pump vs. system curves, profile plots along a flow path, gradelines and elevation profiles, transient plots (with AFT Impulse or the AFT Fathom XTS module), slurry system curves (with AFT Fathom SSL or A
Each AFT software product employs five Primary Window tabs in which you would build, define, and analyze the model of your system. Of these, the Visual Report window is incredibly useful in that you are able to overlay your model input or output parameters directly on top of the graphical layout of the system itself. This is an excellent feature
That night Dr. Revelle talked at length about greenhouse gasses (carbon dioxide in particular) and the danger of man-made global warming. During the question and answer period Dr. Revelle demonstrated a fair minded approach and said the science was not at all settled on the matter. Since then a lot has happened in the areas of science and public p
The Super Bowl is in the books (won by our local Denver Broncos and their "Orange Rush") and the next big thing on the calendar is, of course...National Engineers Week. Yes, this week is "EWeek", the week where we celebrate engineering accomplishments and the engineers behind those accomplishments. As history has shown - especially over the last c
As we started to test the new graphing features we were concerned that users would struggle to access these features. So we came up with an idea that turned into the Graph Guide. What is the Graph Guide, you ask? Well, in simple terms the Graph Guide is an interactive, hierarchical guide built into the Graph Results window which assists the user
The first and most obvious way that AFT software makes the world safer is that our software products help engineers test their designs and operations on their computers where the impact of failure is eliminated. While this is invaluable, it is a bit abstract. So let's get more specific and highlight some applications where safety is impacted. RELI
The primary way to view results when using Impulse is through graphical data. With the release of AFT Impulse 6, the power of the graphing features has been greatly increased. With this enhanced capability comes additional complexity. It is a kin to the power and complexity of in-dash radio consoles in modern cars compared to the old stereo in my o
The process of sizing a pump for the application of priming a piping system as well as for normal operation is slightly more involved than if the system was already primed and the pump was to be sized for a liquid full system. For a system priming application, the intermediate elevations at high points in a piping system are relevant in regar
Scuba divers and casual swimmers alike are all too familiar with the discomfort (and sometimes outright pain) experienced in their ears as they descend deeper into the water. This discomfort is experienced for good reason: for each 33 feet you descend into the water, you experience considerably more pressure (about 1 whole atmosphere) due to the hy
Previously, we talked about the Graph Guide and how to create Stacked Graphs and Dual-Y graphs. With AFT Impulse and with AFT Fathom’s XTS module, a great way to see how parameters change over time is through animated graphs. For the purpose of continuity, I am going to again start with the AFT Impulse model, ‘Pump Startup With Event Transient.imp’
Over the years I have had the privilege to teach training classes to mining companies on five continents. AFT has been active in support of the needs of the mining industry since we released the Settling Slurry (SSL) module for AFT Fathom in 2009 and the SSL module for AFT Impulse in 2012. That is aside from our general support for utility piping
Users and potential users of AFT software frequently ask how they can expedite the model input process so that they can get the results they need as rapidly as they need. I’m pleased to report that AFT software has an abundance of features that make the model input process tremendously efficient: global pipe and junction editing, copying input data
The day-to-day demands of getting AFT going as a company was slowing down the completion of AFT Impulse. So I turned over the day-to-day tasks to the two engineers I had at the time. One of the two, Jeff Olsen, is still with AFT as V.P. Technology. I took my computer and huge CRT monitor home to work in my basement for some long and uninterrupted
AFT Fathom can easily generate a pump and system curve for your piping system. Creating a pump and system curve for a simple system with a single flow path and no control features is an easy and typically well-understood process. However, as piping systems are quite complicated with lots of branch points, control features, and dynamic i
In AFT Fathom and AFT Impulse, it is possible to model a submerged pump where a short and possibly frictionless suction pipe for the pump’s inlet does not need to be modeled. When modeling a submerged pump, there are two options available for specifying the system inlet boundary condition at the pump suction. As shown in Figure 1 below,
Frequently in tech support, when a difficult-to-converge model comes in, one of the first things we check is whether or not any tees in the model are being modeled as detailed tees. The reason for this is that the hydraulic calculations involving detailed tees can be complex due to the interdependence between velocity and pressure loss for each pip
If an engineer isn’t careful, the simplicity with which a computer model can be created can cause the engineer to become a bit complacent. Just as in the days of long, painstaking hand calculations, due diligence is required to ensure information being entered into the model is good and valid data. It’s also important that the results presented by
For a technology organization like HI, 100 years is quite a feat and was rightly celebrated at the annual meeting this year. Many of you are familiar with HI through the standards HI creates. These standards show up in AFT Fathom in several places: Intake design (pump submergence to avoid vortex formation) Pump viscosity corrections Slurry pumps (
Cavitation is an important subject in piping systems. Quite often, cavitation is an operating condition that is to be avoided, such is the case with pumps. Not only can cavitation cause serious decreases in pump performance, but it is also a maintenance nightmare if left unaddressed. Such issues are costly and may lead a system to be deemed unsafe.
As tech support engineers, we sometimes receive questions from users confused about what control valve characteristic curve (inherent or installed) they are inputting into AFT Fathom, AFT Arrow, or AFT Impulse. The inherent control valve characteristic curve plots the valve open percent versus the percent of maximum Cv. This curve is true regardles
Cutting through the mysteries of impeller trimming Centrifugal pumps are a common and integral part of many industrial applications related to fluid flow of any kind. They require significant amounts of energy to operate. Unfortunately, many pumps are oversized for their applications. When pumps are not properly sized this can lead to operational d
To define any transient event in AFT Impulse or AFT Fathom XTS the application must know when it begins. To do so, the user should know how time and event logic is approached in AFT’s transient solvers. In this article, we will discuss the three different time bases used in the applications, the selection of a single or repeating event, and the man
For several users of AFT software, it goes pretty predictably: first you place a pressure junction, then maybe a pump, then some sources of pressure drop including valves and heat exchangers, and then the model is finished off with another pressure junction. Of course, this is greatly oversimplifying the process and the vast array of systems that a
Before I relate my experiences this week, I want to first describe the various elements AFT has built to connect with the needs of universities. Over recent years AFT has been building a program geared towards universities. Most of that program can be accessed on this web page: https://www.aft.com/products/education. If you go there you can see it
What comes to mind when you hear the expression “planning for failure”? For some, it carries the negative connotation that failure is the direct result of a design – intentionally or otherwise. Benjamin Franklin said; “If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail!” and I believe he would agree that any good plan addresses potential failures. In fa
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