Day 3: 5 Interesting Things I Heard Today at the Pump Guy Seminar
The final session of this week’s Pump Guy Seminar in Decatur, Ala. was presented today, and thus I present you here with the final post in my “5 Interesting Things” blog series reporting live from the training. Day 3 offered up a healthy dose of pump piping, shaft deflection, mechanical seal failure analysis, and a range of systems design best practices. Here are a few things that stuck in my head.
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- The resistance multiplier (k) for a 4-inch butterfly valve is about 25 times greater than the resistance multiplier for a 4-inch full-port ball valve. You wouldn’t want to place a butterfly valve on the suction side of the pump because it will starve the pump.
- Most maintenance problems are the product of system changes or modifications to the system over time. Adding or changing filters, valves, flowmeters, etc. can change the system and negatively impact a pump. For example, a new filter with a tighter mesh screen on the suction side of the pump will alter the energy arriving at the pump, resulting in increased maintenance over time. You should re-balance the system after alterations or additions are made to an existing pipe system.
- Alterations on discharge to the discharge pipe can move the pump on its performance curve. Alterations on the suction side will starve the pump.
- Gate valves and globe valves, though they look similar, are not interchangeable. The resistance across a globe valve is about 42 times greater than a gate valve. From a pump’s perspective, exchanging a gate valve for a globe valve is the same as installing 42 gate valves.
- No one in production relates today’s pump bearing failure with the inoffensive installation of a heat exchanger or flowmeter three months ago. Should they? Perhaps your production folks should be at the next Pump Guy Seminar.
Day 2: 5 Interesting Things I Heard Today at the Pump Guy Seminar
Day 1: 5 Interesting Things I Heard Today at the Pump Guy Seminar
For more information about the Pump Guy Seminar and upcoming training programs, visit www.FlowControlNetwork.com/PumpGuy.