Surge in Funny Fluids

Peanut butter, chocolate, ketchup, toothpaste, and paint. Do we have your attention? These might sound funny sitting in a Waterhammer Wednesday email. A toothpaste surge event sounds as messy as you can imagine.

However, waterhammer in nuclear waste processing, ore transportation, oil sands, and sewage...That's not funny at all. The contrast in severity between these fluids is clear, yet all of them are non-Newtonian and typically fit into one of the following categories: Dilatants, Pseudoplastics, Bingham plastics, and Bingham pseudoplastics.

Engineers who design for each of these funny fluids would prefer to avoid a pipeline burst. Again, just imagine the toothpaste example.

So, why do non-Newtonian pipelines burst?

1. Improper consideration of pump performance, especially during an upset event.
2. Misunderstanding system parameters, such as wavespeed.
3. Larger system losses, making low-pressure transients more concerning.

What can you do about it?

Using flow analysis tools like AFT Impulse™, engineers can accommodate for "plugged-up" scenarios and avoid surge problems.

 AFT offers 6 different non-Newtonian fluid models: two pulp and paper stock models (Duffy Method and Brecht & Heller Method), Power Law, Bingham Plastic, Herschel-Buckley, and Homogeneous Scale-up.

Learn how AFT Models non-Newtonian Fluids like soap, silly-putty, or shampoo.