GROUP 1C

MINOR LOSSES IN BENDS AND FITTINGS

Author: Constantin Pruteanu

Student no. 3126004
Submitted: 29 April 2014

AIMS

The aim of this study was to measure K, the dimensionless loss coefficient, for a number of bends
and fittings and to compare them with the values from other reference sources.

EXPERIMENTAL

1. Apparatus
The apparatus consisted of a Hydraulic bench with a pipe and fittings system connected to a water
source, stopwatch and bike pump.

2. Procedure
The water flow was adjusted to the maximum possible reading ensuring that the flowrate does not
reach a point where the menisci in the manometers cannot be seen. The pipe system consists of
following components : water inlet, long radius bend, area enlargement and area reduction as sketched in
the Figure 1, short radius bend, 900 elbow, mitre bend, water collection basin and rubber ball. The readings
for water pressure were taken for each of these components at different flowrates and the volume of
water collected in a certain period of time was measured.

3. Data
Pipe Diameter = 19.48 mm
Enlargement pipe diameter = 26.2 mm

Figure1. Sketch of enlargement and contraction in the pipe system.

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RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

The energy loss in a pipe network with bends and fittings has two components: major loss due to
shear stress between the water and the pipe surface (major loss) and minor loss, energy loss caused
by sudden changes in either direction or velocity as stated by Strothman (2006). The expression used
to determine the head losses is:

(1)
where H is the water column high (mm), K is the dimensionless loss coefficient, g is the gravitational
constant (m/s2) and V is the fluid velocity (m/s). Each style of pipe fitting and pipe bend has an
individual value of K which can be determined only experimentally.
The application of Bernoulli equation for both sections of pipe from Figure 1, gives:

(2)
Where p1 and p2 refer to liquid pressure between two sections of flow (mm of water column), V1 and
V2 refer to liquid velocity at these points in the pipe system (m/s), is water density (kg/m3), g in
gravitational constant (m/s2), z1, and z2 are the elevations relative to a datum (m).
The pressure values (P1 and P2) can be determined from the manometers readings where:

(3)
h is the height of the water in the manometer tube (mm).
Rearranging equation (2) for head losses gives:

(4)
Using the conservation of mass equation:

(5)
where Q is the water flow, A1 and A2 are the area of pipe system, respective the area of enlargement
section (mm2) .
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The head loss equation can be written as:

(6)
where the difference in elevation z1 and z2 between section 1 and 2 can be considered negligible for
this experiment.
Raw data collected in experiment are presented in Appendix A, and example calculations for
pressure difference and velocity are given in Appendix B.
Figure 2 shows the experimentally determined values of the pressure difference between the two
points of the pipe system and the velocity squared over double gravitational constant.

0.10
0.09
0.08
0.07

Mitre

0.06

Elbow
Short Bend

0.05

Long Bend

0.04

Enlargement
Contraction

0.03

V2/2g
0.02
0.01
0.00
0.00

0.01

0.02

0.03

0.04

0.05

0.06

0.07

Figure2. Determined values H and V2/2g.

It can be observed that the slopes for the determined values of pressure and V2/2g are passing
through origin and they have almost similar trend. The experiment was conducted under time
restrictions and there was not enough time to have few checks readings before the start of
experiment.

Observing the lines on the graph above it can be concluded that the differences in pressure for long
bend and enlargement sections are very similar and the contraction section is the closest to the V 2/2g
line.
Comparing the calculated results for loss coefficient K in different sections of pipe system with
similar results it can concluded that the calculated values are only for few sections similar to other
results. For the mitre section the calculated results are between 1.52 and 2.26 with an average of 1.80
which are very different comparing with other calculated results 1.25 (Appendix C). For elbow
section only one of the calculated values 1.06 is close to other similar results, 1.00. For short bend
the calculated values 0.62 is the closest one to the other results 0.50 and in long bend section the
calculated values for K 0.24, 0.25 are similar with other published results 0.20, 0.40. In the
enlargement and contraction sections the average calculated results are close to each other but out of
range of other calculated results. The average uncertainty for the calculated results is 0.08 as
presented in Appendix D.
These results raise few questions regarding the experiment undertaken. It was conducted very early
in the morning and the water temperature could be below 20C which will increase the viscosity that
could explain our calculated results. Apart of this there are few missing details about our pipe
system, the roughness internal surface in the pipes could affect the calculated results as well as the
size proportions (R/D) for elbows.
For this experiment it can be outlined few sources of errors: the shear stress within the liquid layers
and the pipe system which will affect the energy balance of fluid Gomez-Osorio et al. (2013).
Another factor which affected our results is the fact that we ignored the difference in elevation
between the sections of fitting elements. Due to the difference between the thermal expansion
coefficients of the pipes material and the enclosed water a systematic measurement deviation is
caused if the temperature of the water varies during experiment. Rainer and Baade (2012) have found
that the variation of water temperature implies a change in water density, thus, this effect has to be
taken into account for analysing the measurement uncertainty of a flow. A detailed variation of water
density with temperature is presented in Appendix E.

CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMANDATIONS

An experiment for determining the K head loss coefficient in a pipe system was undertaken. Results
were presented in terms of calculated K coefficients using the difference of pressure between two
points of the pipe system and the volume of water collected in a certain time. Results were found to
compare favourably with other published values for few section of pipe system.
It would be recommended for a future K head loss coefficient measurement experiment to have
prepared a spreadsheet with preloaded formulas in order to determine K values during experiment
and to compare them with similar results. In case of significant difference it will be considered the
parameters of fittings: radius, distance, internal roughness.
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NOMENCLATURE

Gravitational constant (9.81)

m/s2

Elevation of water

pA

Water column pressure at point A

mm

pB

Water column pressure at point B

mm

Time

zA

Elevation relative to a datum of point A

zB

Elevation relative to a datum of point B

Area of pipes cross-section

m2

Distance

mm

Elevation of water

Loss coefficient

Volume

m3

Radius for elbow

mm

Liquid density

kg/m3

REFERENCES
Gomez-Osorio, M.A., et al., 2013, A formulation for the flow rate of a fluid passing through an
orifice plate from the First Law of Thermodynamics, Flow Measurement and Instrumentation
Journal, vol. 23, pp 197-201.
Rainer, E., Baade, H.J., 2012, Water density determination in high-accuracy flowmeter calibration
Measurement uncertainties and practical aspects, Flow Measurement and Instrumentation Journal,
vol. 25, pp 40-53.
Strothman, J., 2006, ISA Handbook of Measurement Equations and Tables (2nd Edition), ISA
Online version available at: http://app.knovel.com/hotlink/toc/id:kpISAHMET1/isa-handbookmeasurement.