Calculating and Exporting

Forces from Impulse

Reinaldo Pinto
Global Sales Manager
Email: reinaldopinto@aft.com
Webinar Agenda
 About Applied Flow Technology
 Industry Applications
 Overview of AFT Software
 Customers
 AFT impulse
– Code Compliance
– AFT Impulse Model - Hammer
– Calculate Unbalance Forces
– Exporting Force Data
 Q/A session

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Agenda

Type your
questions
About Applied Flow Technology
 Applied Flow Technology (AFT) is an international software
development and consulting company
 Founded in 1993, AFT has rapidly grown to be a leader in the pipe
flow modeling software market
 Primary business focus is developing high quality fluid flow analysis
products for Microsoft Windows
Industry Applications

 AFT products are being successfully applied to a broad range of industrial

systems:
– Power generation systems (Nuclear and Fossil)
– Chemical and petrochemical systems
– Oil and gas production, transportation, refining and delivery
– Marine and offshore
– Automotive systems
– Aerospace systems
– Air conditioning and refrigeration systems
– Semi-conductor manufacturing systems
– Pulp and paper processing
– Fire suppression
– Water and Wastewater treatment plant design
– Mining processing and support systems
– Biomedical products and pharmaceutical processing
– Municipal water distribution

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 AFT Software Products
Analysis
 AFT Fathom™ (1994)
 Incompressible pipe flow
 Three add-on modules
 AFT Arrow™ (1995)
 Compressible pipe flow
 One add-on module
 AFT Impulse™ (1996)
 Waterhammer
 One add-on module
 AFT (Fathom, Arrow & Impulse)
Viewer
Design
 AFT Mercury™ (2001)
 Incompressible pipe flow
 AFT Titan™ (2003)
 Compressible pipe flow
Utility
 AFT SteamCalc™ (1995)
 Engineering Utility Suite
(1995)
 Chempak (1999)
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 AFT Software Products (Cont.)

Support Education
 AFT Flow Expert Package (New) AFT Academic Program
AFT Flow Expert Packages provide  Licenses for Research and
consulting services beyond typical
technical support requests on the
Development
installation, upgrade assistance, and  Licenses for Hydraulic
functionality of AFT software Courses

Package Options
 5 Hours
 10 Hours
 20 Hours

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Transient Analysis

AFT IMPULSE

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Code Compliance

Once the overpressure is calculated, What should the designer do with

this value?
The answer to this question depends on the code being used.

 ASME Code for pressure piping B31.4. Pipeline Transportation

Systems for Liquid Hydrocarbons and Other Liquids.
B31.4 refers directly to the maximum value of the overpressure,
establishing a limit of 10% above the design pressure.

 ASME Code for pressure piping B31.3. Process Piping

The maximum stress produce the loads created by the surge pressure
shall not exceed: 1.33 Sh (Sh=allowable stress for the operating
temperature).
AFT Impulse Model - Hammer
AFT Impulse Model – Hammer (cont.)
In this example, the cooling water supply line shown below
suffers a pressure surge when the turbine driven pump drops
offline, due to a bearing temperature problem.
 Fluid: Water at 140 oF
 Flow: 130 lbm/Sec
 Supply pressure: 250 Psig.
 Design Pressure: 350 Psig
 Pipe: ANSI 8”; Sch 40
 Turbine Trip:

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 B31.4
 Calculate the 10% above the design pressure
 Set the design alerts to the calculated pressure
 B31.3
 Calculate the unbalanced forces
 Export to a Pipe Stress program
Calculate Unbalance Forces
Calculating Unbalanced Forces (cont.)

 AFT Impulse can calculate unbalanced forces in a system

based on the transient system pressures
– In AFT Impulse “forces” is typically used to imply “unbalanced
hydraulic forces”
 Both differential and point forces can be calculated
 Calculated forces can be plotted in the Graph Results window
 Calculated forces can also be exported to Force vs. Time data
files which can then be imported into stress analysis
applications such as CAESAR II and TRIFLEX

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Calculating Unbalanced Forces

 There are multiple forces that come into play when calculating
unbalanced forces
– Pressure difference between points
– Friction forces
– Fluid momentum changes (including area changes)

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Calculating Unbalanced Forces
Consider the loads caused by a sudden change in pressure, and follow
this pressure change as it moves through the pipe from its source to a
termination point at roughly the speed of sound. Between elbows, there
is a static pressure force that is exerted on each elbow along the axis
of the pipe, equal to the pressure multiplied by the inside area of the
pipe. During the short duration where one elbow sees the elevated
pressure while the next one does not, there is a net-differential force
acting on the elbow pair that can be quite significant. Once the
elevated pressure reaches the next elbow, the pressures equalize and
the differential load between the elbows disappears. Figure 1 illustrates
this force imbalance where the flow has been stopped downstream and
the transient pressure wave is traveling opposite to the original flow
direction. For some finite duration of time, the pressure is higher at
node 2 than node 1, causing a net unbalanced pressure force in the
direction of the original flow.

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Calculating Unbalanced Forces

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Calculating Unbalanced Forces
Assuming that your hand-calculated pressure rise is reasonably
accurate, this method is reliable for simple systems such as in Figure
1, but the introduction of in-line components adds a level of complexity
that quickly renders these calculations useless. For example, if we
introduce a valve in the line and partially close it, some difficulties arise
for the manual calculation method.

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Calculating Unbalanced Forces
The traditional hand-calculation in this scenario would be an attempt to
sum all of the pressure forces acting at both elbows and both sides of
the partially closed valve. With a partial valve closure, what are the
magnitudes of the transient pressures? What pressure loads are acting
on each side of the valve? As each pressure wave travels up and
reflects back down each leg, how do these loads match up over time at
the elbows and at each side of the valve? With these complexities, the
accuracy of our manual calculation becomes highly suspect. The ability
to perform a comprehensive, computer-based hydraulic transient
analysis allows us to consider all of the loads occurring in the line:
pressure forces, hydraulic forces at components, friction and
momentum, as they all change over time, and achieve an accurate
representation of the transient event and resulting loading

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Calculating Unbalanced Forces (cont.)

 Pressure difference between points, friction and momentum

are not typically taken into account, though each will bias the
force calculation
 In cases where force sets span across two pipes and the
pipes have a different diameter, the area change itself cannot
create an unbalanced force even though the static pressure
changes
– AFT Impulse automatically accounts for this in the force balance
calculation

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 Calculating Unbalanced Forces (cont.)
Enhanced Force Calculations consider all hydraulic loading

Friction & pressure loss forces

Force = PA x A Force = PB x A
Momentum = mAΔVX,A Momentum = mBΔVX,B
A = πD2/4

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Defining Force Sets

 In order to process force data, the locations where the forces

are to be calculated must be defined
– The forces may be defined as differential or point forces
 Forces are defined on the Force Output tab in the Transient
Control window

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Defining Force Sets (2)

 Force Sets are defined by a Start Node and an End Node

 For each node the user must specify:
– The pipe where the force is to be calculated
– The distance from the start of the pipe (Station 0) to the location
of the node
– The closest pipe station to the specified distance along the pipe
will be selected automatically

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Viewing Force Data (2)

 The forces calculated by Impulse represent the force of the

fluid acting on the pipe and supports.

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Exporting Force Data

 Transient force/time data can be exported by copying the data

to the clipboard from the Graph Results window
 Alternatively, the “Save Graph Data As…” option on the File
menu in the Graph Results window allows the plotted
force/time data to be saved as a text file
 After the force/time data has been exported, the user has the
option of bringing the data into other applications
– Spreadsheets
– Stress analysis

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Exporting Force Data - CAESAR

 Transient force/time data can be exported in a format that can

be loaded directly into the CAESAR II or TRIFLEX pipe stress
application
– Select “Export CAESAR II Force File” (or TRIFLEX) from the File
menu
– This will open the Export CAESAR II Force File window
– This window allows the user to define the content of a force/time
data file and export it

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Exporting Force Data – CAESAR (cont.)
Here, users can select which force sets they want to export, the force and time
units, and whether to
neglect or include friction and momentum.
A limitation of CAESAR II is that its AFT Import utility can handle a maximum of
2500 data points, whereas AFT Impulse may generate a force file with more
than this.
When more than 2500 are generated, the user will need to adjust the data set
exported by setting a user specified time frame, and/or by selecting a wider
time-step between data points.
Usually, the transient events of interest to the stress analyst are less than a few
seconds in duration, so a 30 second Impulse analysis duration can often be
quite easily narrowed to a specific time-frame of interest.
Note that CAESAR II expects to receive this data in time-units of seconds
using the AFT import utility, while CAESAR II users familiar with the
dynamic input are accustomed to entering time data manually in
millisecond units.

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Exporting Force Data – CAESAR (cont.)
More than one force-time data set can be stored in one force-time file, which
can represent the loading at several points in the piping system.
In this example, we have selected one force-file that contains two force-time
profiles for two elbow locations being loaded. The selection of force-time data
for both legs was done in Impulse. If you export individual force-time data for
single legs of pipe in separate force-time files, CAESAR II will not let you
combine them afterward in this dialog.
To combine multiple force-time profiles for multiple pipe legs, you must
export them at the same time into one file in Impulse.
You next click your mouse on each of the force files in order to activate the
prompt required to specify the node numbers in the CAESAR II model where
the loads will be applied. For this model, we are applying the loads at nodes
110 and 75.
You may wish to adjust the number of data points that will be used to represent
the response curve, and you may sometimes need to adjust the maximum
value on the frequency axis of the response curve.

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Exporting Force Data – CAESAR (cont.)
To import the force-time data for Spectral analysis, we access the AFT Impulse
utility through CAESAR
II’s Tools drop-down menu:
Tools > External Interfaces > AFT Impulse
which will launch
the following dialog:

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Exporting Force Data – CAESAR (cont.)

Each of the two force files loaded in this example will be used to create two separate response curves
that CAESAR II will use to predict how each natural frequency in the system will respond to each
load.
When you finish the selections & click the Ok button, CAESAR II warns you that the force data in the
force-time files lack directional information. AFT Impulse does not “speak” in the XYZ terms that are
understood by CAESAR II; it relies on non-directional lengths and elevations. This means that the
user
is required to specify the direction of the loads after CAESAR II creates the dynamic input.

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Exporting Force Data – CAESAR (cont.)

You are next asked whether you want CAESAR II to create the dynamic input.

If you click Yes, you will then need to choose the CAESAR II file that will have the dynamic input
added to it. When you next open CAESAR II’s dynamic input, you will see the input created, starting
with the definitions of the response spectrum graphs that were created in the Spectrum Definitions
tab.
You may need to scroll down the list to see them, as CAESAR II does automatically list other built-in
spectra. These additional spectra can be safely deleted from the list to tidy-up the input if you wish,
by
highlighting the unwanted lines of data (using the gray column on the left) and the red “ –” button.
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Unbalanced Forces Across 3+ Pipes

 Unbalanced forces may be

calculated across three or
more pipes
– Pipes must be connected
sequentially end to end

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Unbalanced Forces Across 3+ Pipes (2)

 All of the pipes in the path must

be added to a named group

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Unbalanced Forces Across 3+ Pipes (3)

 Define the force set in the Transient Control window

– Select “Difference (3+ Pipes)” as the Force Type
– Select the appropriate Group Name under Pipe Group

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Q/A Session

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Reinaldo Pinto
Global Sales Manager
Email: reinaldopinto@aft.com

Thank You

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