PIPE-FLO currently provides solutions for a wide variety of industries with over 5,500 current licenses in use. Read more information on how our customers are solving problems on real world piping systems.

A variety of case studies are included in the PIPE-FLO Demo. When you open one of the case study projects you will find a FLO-Link that will take you to the Knowledge Base article located on our Website. Here you can view and print step-by-step instructions that you can use to follow along with the article.

A quick overview of the various Knowledge Base articles is included below. Click on the link to display a summary of the article in the Knowledge Base, along with a link to detailed instructions in PDF format. These detailed instructions can be viewed and printed. Existing PIPE-FLO Customers can access retail versions of the PIPE-FLO project files so they too can run the Case Study examples.

Pump Sizing - Selecting the proper pump is the most important step in the designing of a piping system. This case study provides instructions for using PIPE-FLO to select the best centrifugal pump.

Balancing the System - Often cooling and heating piping systems are not properly balanced to deliver the required flow rate to the various loads. Two things occur when this happens. 1. More fluid than is needed is pumped through the system, which increases pumping cost. 2. The extra flow through the various paths cannot be used for future system load expansion, which increases the capitol cost. This example shows how to use PIPE-FLO to balance a cooling system.

Problem Control Valves - Many times even the simplest piping system presents a large problem when it is not operating properly. In this example, we have a single pump circuit pumping from a supply tank to a pressurized tank. We will use PIPE-FLO to discover what can be done to correct a problem with a control valve.

Finding System Bottlenecks - As process loads increase, additional fluid is pumped through the system. Without a clear picture of the entire piping system you can quickly pay a high price in pumping cost to get a small increase in flow rate. This study is based on an analysis of a reclaim water pump system at a nickel mining operation. You will see how a quickly modeling the piping system allowed the plant engineer to save over $250,000 per year in pumping costs.

Minimizing Pumping Cost - In this study we will see how calculating a pump’s design point can improve the pump operation and minimize pumping cost. You will quickly see how important it is to re-evaluate a system when any changes are made.

Piping System Expansion - In this example, we will be adding four new banks of tools to the ultra pure water system in an integrated circuit manufacturing facility. You will see how to use PIPE-FLO’s copy features to quickly add to an existing system. Once the changes have been made we will see their effect on the system operation.

Time Simulation with PIPE-FLO - It is often necessary to observe how a piping system operates over time. PIPE-FLO is a steady state hydraulic analysis program, and therefore is not designed to perform extended period simulation. However, there are a couple of options for extending PIPE-FLO’s capabilities to include dynamic system analysis. In this example, you will see how use the Lineup feature, and some simple calculations outside the program to perform some simple time simulation studies.

Time Simulation with Overtime - If you have Engineered Software’s Overtime program, you can simulate any PIPE-FLO system’s operation over an extended period of time. The Overtime program gives the user complete control over the duration and frequency of a time simulation. In addition, it allows for a dynamic analysis of even the most complex PIPE-FLO systems. In this example, you will see how to use Overtime in conjunction with PIPE-FLO to perform a time simulation.

Variable Speed Pumps - When designing piping systems in which the system demand varies (for example, a chilled water distribution system with varying loads throughout the year), variable speed pumps may be an effective energy and cost savings option. In these systems, the pump speed can be adjusted to meet the varying demands of the system. This article describes the implementation and operation of both fixed speed and variable speed pumps in PIPE-FLO and Flow of Fluids.