AFT Blog
The Opposite of Good Vibrations - Evaluating FIV, AIV, FIP Guidelines from AFT Fathom and AFT Arrow
Learn how to use AFT Fathom and AFT Arrow to help calculate the Likelihood of Failure (LOF) for Flow Induced Vibration (FIV), Acoustic Induced Vibration (AIV), and Flow Induced Pulsation (FIP) in accordance with Energy Institute Guidelines to avoid v...
It's a Pump! It's a Turbine! It's a Pump as Turbine!
Pumps and turbines may serve opposite purposes, but fundamentally, they operate under the same principles. Both pieces of equipment convert between usable work and fluid energy, and both often use an impeller to make the conversion. Differences betwe...
What Is Transient Analysis?
You're tasked to perform a transient analysis of a piping system and it would be really helpful if there was a good software tool out there to help you. Well, you've come to the right place because AFT has great solutions! ...
Know Your Pump & System Curves - Part 3
In the final "Know Your Pump & System Curves" blog series, I am going to discuss the complexities behind pump vs. system curves for systems with pumps in series and parallel configurations. Multiple pumps in series configurations are relatively s...
Digital Twin – Identical or Fraternal?
When I was a child, I was jealous of twins. I thought how cool it would be to have a twin. I had twin cousins a few years older than I was that I saw on a frequent basis. I always got them confused. Which one was Roger, and which one was Ronny? A buz...
That Valve’s Got Character – Applying Pre-defined Characteristic Curves
Valves are often oversimplified during modeling. Understandably, defining a valve with its range of Cv at various open percentages requires much more information than an engineer may have during the initial design phase. However, just like handbook d...
Way back 18 years ago, in February 2001, AFT introduced a groundbreaking new technology to the marketplace. We called the technology IntelliFlow® and it was implemented in a new product called AFT Mercury™. We liked to tell people that "AFT Mercury is AFT Fathom on steroids". AFT Mercury built on the foundation of AFT Fathom, and the IntelliFlow te...
I remember when I joined ASME as a senior in engineering school. I remember the day I received my first copy of Mechanical Engineering magazine - and what the cover story was about (I still have a copy of that magazine!). I remember attending my first ASME conference (where I presented my first paper). It is an understatement to say that my enginee...
Vacuum breaker and air valves are useful tools in the industry for protecting pipelines against vacuum or near vacuum conditions. High points in the pipe can be susceptible to these low-pressure conditions during surge events, as pressure waves moving through the system cause a sudden pressure upsurge or downsurge. AFT Impulse can help engineers to...
1. Guarantee the system will work according to design2. Understand complex system interactions3. Ensure design requirements are still met in different operating cases4. Evaluate system dynamics of surge and non-surge related transient operation5. Easily plan for future expansions and system modifications6. Empower clients to better understand their...
To all of the engineers reading this article, we made it! Whew! Reading a three-part series is like running a marathon. Way to go! If you are new to this series, we encourage you to read this article as well as the previous two: Part 1: Six Reasons to Use a Flow Analysis and Part 2: Flow Analysis Is Neglected. In this article are six reasons e...
We hope you enjoyed our previous article on the Top 6 Reasons Your Design Should Include Flow Analysis. But now… let's get a bit serious and talk about three main reasons why flow analysis is neglected during the design process. It could be straight neglect, or unconscious neglect. Either way we will open the conversation and provide some insi...
We are frequently asked about AFT capabilities, and today I want to talk about how to model the heat transfer on heat exchangers. This is something we have discussed previously. But apparently, it is still a confusing topic while using AFT Products to model systems in which heat exchangers are present. First, I have to say that in fact it is ...