Brooks Instrument Blog

The longstanding popularity of variable area flow meters is well warranted, as it’s been the go-to piece of equipment for the measurement of gas, liquid and steam flow for a century.  But as the times change and processing of petrochemicals and other petroleum-based products becomes more globalized, finding cost-effective and reliable measurement devices is growing in importance.

Our free webinar, “One World One Product: Bringing a Global Perspective to Metal Tube Variable Area Flow Meters,” on April 16 you will give you the opportunity to learn about the most recent innovations in VA flow meters, including a brand new product just entering the market now.

You will learn how to use the best product for your project or company to minimize plant downtime, get tips on making sure you have the right VA meter for your specs, and more.  Receive a thorough overview of exactly how a VA meter works from our experts, as well as tips on how to find a supplier that best suits your service, inspection, and team needs.

The key speaker will be Jim Dillon, a global product manager at Brooks Instrument and an expert in the field of both rotameters and engineering. So come and learn from the best. You can enroll by clicking here.

I am a firm believer that the world is getting smaller each day. I credit this reduction in size to technology.  We can contact anyone in the world in seconds by using texts, emails, phone calls and video conferences.  

So how does this “shrinking planet” impact a flow meter and more specifically, a variable area meter (rotameter)?

Read more…

Winning Control Global’s Readers Choice Awards is probably one of the best awards that we can win because the winners are chosen by the users of instrumentation. You can check out the full press release about this here, but below is the gist.

Brooks was honored in three categories, variable area flowmeter, positive displacement flowmeter and thermal mass flowmeter. For variable area flow meter, this was the 15th consecutive year we have place 1st in this category. And for positive displacement flow meter, this is the 18th consecutive year we have placed 1st. Quite an achievement if I do say so myself! For thermal mass flow meter, we placed 4th this year.

Thanks to Control Global and a special thank you to all the readers of Control Magazine that voted for Brooks!

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…

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…

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.

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.

Yesterday, during the Chem Show in New York City, our very own Steve Kannengieszer was interviewed by Chemical Processing magazine‘s Senior Digital Editor, Traci Purdum. We’re still waiting for the video but I thought I would share some of the Q&A’s that were covered. If you are at the Chem Show, stop by and see us at booth 303! Read more…