Brooks Instrument Blog

Yesterday I covered flow rate and reference conditions and talked about how important (or not) these are to specifying a variable area (VA) flow meter. Today, I’ll finish up my tips by reviewing fluid density and viscosity as well as accuracy.

Fluid: Density and viscosity
We always have questions about the fluid such as gas or liquid.  What are the density and viscosity?  Is it corrosive or opaque?  If it a know fluid such as air, nitrogen, water, etc.  The questions get much easier because the world has defined how these known fluids behave so we can easily determine density and viscosity for common fluids such as air, water, nitrogen, etc.  Which leads to the questions as to why do we need to know fluid density and viscosity?  Fluid density and viscosity are important because these two values allow us to select the right flow meter (meter size).  We call this sizing.  What is behind sizing?  Briefly, performance data has been collected on all of the different meters we offer.  We query the performance data and look for flow meters that fit the supplied process conditions (density and viscosity).  Usually there are many flow meters that fit your conditions.  From there it becomes a matter of preference, available options, price or accuracy.  This leads me to my last topic on VA meters, which is accuracy. Read more…

In yesterday’s blog post, I took you through why we need to know about your normal and maximum operating temperatures and pressures in your application to specify the right variable area (VA) flow meter for your process. Today, we’ll dive into flow rates and reference conditions.

3. Flow rate – minimum, maximum, normal
Of course flow rate is an obvious requirement but it is more complicated than it appears.  The goal is to specify a VA meter where the normal operating flow is in the 60% to 80% of the meter’s range.  Why you ask because a variable area meter is more accurate in the upper part of its range.  I will talk more about accuracy in my next blog post.  Of course a flow meter needs to be chosen that handles the minimum and maximum flows too.  The other component of flow rate is the units.  Read more…

Variable area (VA) flow meters will respond like the canary in the mine when the air quality changes.  If process conditions change there usually is an impact on flow rate.  For example if back pressure changes on gas flows the float/flow will change just as changes in liquid viscosity will have a similar impact to the float/flow.

VA meters reacting to changes in process conditions can be a good or bad thing based on a user’s viewpoint, which brings us back to the real question.  So why do we need so much information to specify the proper VA meter?  I will go through the questions and explain why it is necessary.  The information needed is: Read more…

I have to say, this was a fun one to do around the holiday’s. I enjoyed seeing a lot of the guesses coming in for our Guess the Year this Flow Meter was Made blog post. A few thought the answer was in the serial number, but it wasn’t. For a while there I didn’t think anyone was going to get it right. So many people guessed within a  year! But the correct year was …

1954

We had 5 winners that will be receiving a 4GB memory stick in the shape of a Brooks GF40/80 Series mass flow controller/mass flow meter.

Happy New Year everyone!

While we were cleaning out our offices a few weeks ago a co-worker of mine handed me a great Norman Rockwell oil painting that we used to have hanging in one of our hallways. It was taken down when we were updating our facility. He wasn’t sure what to do with it. The reason we used to have it hanging up in the walls at Brooks (and the reason I’m going to find it another nice home on our walls) is because in the background of the picture you can see some Brooks Sho-Rate variable area flow meters between the two men on the left. Brooks provided Sho-Rate flow meters to  NASA for some of the first missions into space. Read more…

We always like to take the opportunity to share our customer success stories. Here’s one from the land Down Under where Brooks worked with Measurement Plus Pty. Ltd. to install a new gas mixing system at a research institute in Melbourne.

Researchers at the institute were using N2, CO, CO2 and Ar to stabilize a reaction chamber. However, at some point during the process, they wanted the ability to flow in a mixture of these gases. At the time, the institute was using older Brooks thermal mass flow meters inside a self-designed panel. The panel and its components were about 30 years old, rusted and looked like a bird’s nest. Read more…

Last week a co-worker of mine was cleaning out some old marketing demos and found the beauty pictured below. This is an old Full-View variable area flow meter. We took guesses amongst ourselves as to what year this was manufactured. The product manager, Jim Dillon, had to find out. So he went and pulled technical microfilm … that’s right, I said microfilm! It took a a few days because the machine to read the microfilm needed a new fuse. This was turning into quite the project!!! Well … we found out the year. You can see the order form pictured below. I blocked out any indication of what year this was produced. Can you guess?

Take a guess before the year is through (deadline is 12/31/11) and the first ten (10) responders that guess the correct year this product was produced will win a 4GB memory stick shaped like our new GF40/80 thermal mass flow meter/mass flow controller.

This has been a product that we have been working on and perfecting on over the past several months and I’m extremely excited to finally formally launch the new GF40 and GF80 thermal mass flow controller and flow meter! These mass flow controllers provide outstanding performance, reliability and flexibility in many gas flow measurement and control applications. One of the best features of this new mass flow controller is the patented 4th generation MultiFlo gas and range configurability. MultiFlo programming is simple and fast – a new gas and range can be programmed under 60 seconds plus the device can be programmed without removing it from service or disconnecting the device from any process or tool control system.

The GF40/GF80 Series mass flow controllers features fast sub one second settling times and corrosion-resistant Hastalloy sensor tube for long-term stability. The superior valve technology provides minimum leak-by, maximum turndown and fast response which reduces overall gas panel cost and increases throughput. Additionally, the measurement accuracy of every device is verified using traceable primary calibration standards.

Want to learn more? Download the datasheet or contact your local sales engineer.

I thought this short application success story was worth sharing!

A major chemical company was looking for an economical solution to purging cabinets that are used in Division 2 hazardous areas. Division 2 locations are areas where hazardous gases are only present under abnormal conditions. The customer has been using a Z Purge System, which not only purges the cabinet but maintains a positive pressure in the cabinet. The positive pressure keeps the hazardous gases from entering the cabinet where a spark could cause an explosion. The economical solution tested by the customer was a model 2510 plastic tube flow meter. The model 2510 variable area flow meter flows a known volume of purge gas into the cabinet which maintains a positive pressure. A flow meter is not the answer for every customer but it worked for this one!

Do you have a similar application? Let us know.

I’m personally very excited to present to everyone our brand new Brooks Instrument product guide. Updated with all of our latest and greatest products like the GF40/80 mass flow meter / mass flow controller, XacTorr vacuum capacitance manometer, SolidSense II pressure transducer/transmitter, pressure gauges, LF200 ultrasonic liquid flow controller, and more. I won’t bore you with a long blog post about this product guide, just download it and check it out instead!