Conceptual Hydraulic Design
The simulation techniques used by HAL are capable of being used as a design tool rather than being limited to demonstrating surge effects. In this respect HAL can offer advice in designing the hydraulic system to be more suited to its purpose, to improve its safety and to cost less money. For example, our design advice has been used in the past to address the following issues:
- Determining the maximum flow capacity of a system (e.g. ship/ shore cargo transfer).
- Advising on pipeline routing and elevation profile.
- Optimising the pipework bore by calculating the pumping costs vs. pipeline diameter for typical pipe materials.
- Estimating the changes in piping roughness caused by wax deposition. Hence determine the optimum pigging frequency to maximise production throughput.
- Verifying the proposed operating procedures will work in practice. For example, we recently demonstrated a client's water injection pipeline would not be able to start up due to the pump tripping on high run-out flow. An acceptable solution was developed which involved changing the operating procedures.
- Specifying surge suppression equipment to improve both the peak pressures and the overall operability of the pipeline. For example, determining the check valve size, type and dynamic performance needed to prevent check valve slam. Or specifying the best location for air valves and their sizing.
If high surge pressures are unavoidable in the system then it is often useful to fit surge suppression equipment or make design modifications to reduce the surge pressures. Previous work by HAL has enabled thinner piping to be used and so provided savings of up to 20 percent over traditional design methods.