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Accurate determination of the flow rate through pneumatic devices and components
is essential to the design and optimization of industrial equipment using these
components. Indeed, the complexity of current approaches remains a barrier
to their understanding, therefore, their generalization. This issue often occurs in
pneumatic power transmission and also in the compressible fluid control valves.
It is however important for all the users to be familiar with the methods used to
determinate the flow rate characteristics of the installed devices.
A theory taking into account the compressibility of the fluid was developed in
several prior works; they allow characterizing the flow through any device by
considering the choked and the unchoked flow. The methodology developed in
the literature needs at least two coefficients: critical pressure ratio and flow rate
coefficient.
From a theoretical development, and subsequent simplified theory, this publication
provides a simple method to calculate flow coefficients and the critical pressure
ratios for all pneumatic components condidered separately or as an assembly, in
compressible fluid when the flow is assumed to be adiabatic.
An exhaustive experimental study is conducted to verify the assumptions made
here and validated the theoretical results.
