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Caleffi Quicksetter

Zman
Zman Member Posts: 7,611
in THE MAIN WALL
This is mostly a question for @Hotrod. I had a conversation today with an engineer about flow indicator balancing valves like the Quicksetter. He claimed that he did not prefer them in glycol systems because the glycol makes them wildly inaccurate. The Quicksetter specs say they are good to 50% glycol. My question is, does the glycol effect accuracy of the valve and if so, by how much?
"If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough"
Albert Einstein

Comments

  • HomerJSmith
    HomerJSmith Member Posts: 2,635
    It seems to me that flow is flow whether it's molasses or air. If the device is designed to measure flow it would do so even if the flow material were more or less dense.

    I would like to know that too.
  • pecmsg
    pecmsg Member Posts: 5,292
    Specific Gravity can affect the flow meters readings but only an extremely small %
  • hot_rod
    hot_rod Member Posts: 23,392
    edited February 2021
    Let me find out what the accuracy is at 50%. Tricky thing about glycol, snowmelt for example. When it is cold it can be very thick, as it warms the viscosity changes.

    I have a bucket of 100% in my shop and it pours about like milk, at 60°. Not so if I leave it outside, its more like cold motor oil :)

    If you google PG viscosity, you can find temperature/ viscosity tables.

    Makes me wonder how the circulators with GPM readouts compensate for changing glycol viscosity??

    Here is the derate info.
    Bob "hot rod" Rohr
    trainer for Caleffi NA
    Living the hydronic dream
  • HomerJSmith
    HomerJSmith Member Posts: 2,635
    The flow thru a valve is dependent on density and pressure. This is why CV of a valve is measured at 60 deg H2O @ 1 psi, a standard necessary for comparison. The screenshot that hot-rod posted is for a quicksetter pretty much follow the derating of a pump curve.

    So, the gauge reading on the quicksetter is valid only for water, hmmm How does the temperature (as high as 180 degs) affect the gauge reading or does the scale take that into account? What is the percentage of error in the scale?

    I never thought of these things before. Zman, you're keeping me up at nite, I need my sleep.

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