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2.6.3.
Pipe Fill Control Menu
2.6.3.1. Overview
The hydraulic systems are affected by the “water hammer” phenomenon, occurring in case of sudden
changes in pressure and that may damage piping, thus adversely affecting the lifetime of the system.
The water hammer phenomenon may occur if pipes are filled in an abrupt way.
The Pipe Fill function has been developed to smoothly control pipe fill and avoid water hammer phenomena
damaging hydraulic outlets (such as irrigation nozzles) by limiting the system filling rate.
The Pipe Fill logic is a general-
purpose one to better meet the customer’s application requirements, i.e.
vertical or horizontal systems:
•
In vertical systems, the more pipes are full, the greater the pressure. In that case, the acceleration
ramp must be slower and maintain constant flow rate for the time required for pressure stabilization.
•
In horizontal systems, pressure does not increase during pipe fill, so the pipe fill rate may be attained
quickly and can be kept constant for the time required to fill the whole pipe length.
The figures below show the pipe fill rate trend over time in case of vertical and horizontal plant.
Figure 7: Pipe Fill function