How to measure the flow rate of a large pipe with a diameter of 3m
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When going to the site for inspections, such as in thermal power plants, one often comes across large pipes with a diameter of 2-3 meters, which are buried underground; the length of the straight sections above ground is very short. In a situation like this, how should the water flow rate be measured? The electromagnetic aperture isn’t up to par, and there may not be an interface on site. Everything else about the ultrasound is fine; it just doesn’t have enough space for patches, and the straight section is very short. I wonder how people actually measure it?
1. There should be pipeline data available to check the operation conditions of the original design. 2. Calculations can be used; the differences are generally within a few percent. 3. Ultrasonic flow meters can be utilized, trying to avoid issues such as bubbles or turbulent flow
Requirements can be made for the straight pipe section; it seems that ordinary flow meters can also be used
Generally, flow meters should be installed at the outlet of pipeline pumps in water systems or near the user points.
The reality is that the site does not have a straight pipe section long enough to meet the requirements for ultrasonic measurement; in other words, the design team responsible for construction did not take into account the subsequent needs of our testing team, with the straight pipe section on the ground being only a few meters at most. But I think not the entire industry is like this; perhaps the few thermal power plants I visited are just exceptions.
At the thermal power plant site I visited, there were several air-cooling tower systems associated with the condensers, and I wanted to measure the flow rate of the cooling water in those towers, but no locations for flow measurement were provided. I wonder if this is an isolated case or if it’s the same across the entire industry.