The H-Factor

Reducing Entropy

Recent Posts

Unblocking a Group of Files

After downloading a file, it is often Blocked. You must right-click on it, pick Properties and then check the Unblock item: But doing a dozen or more files gets old, real fast. I just learned a way to Unblock a batch of files at once. It involves using PowerShell, a Microsoft tool that is a…

Adding Hanger Types to HydraLIST

If you want to use a new type of hanger, or are a fab shop that gets a job from a contractor that uses a hanger type that you do not have, it is easy to add that new hanger type to your own machine. A hanger is an assembly, and an assembly is just…

Welcome

Recently our previous blog service (Typepad) ended their business – so, we have a new home. It will take a bit to get images back and displaying properly, but we are working on it! Final pageview count of original Typepad blog: 387,232

October 2026
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Author: art

  • You might be in a situation where you want to move some riser nipple tags and want to keep them together, so that they line up nicely. There is a tool to do this with pipe tags and hanger tags, but not with riser nipple tags. Which is where Grips come in. Grips have dozens…

  • A customer contacted me today about having trouble using our commands. The cause was that he was using a template that someone else in his company had made, and it wasn’t compatible with our program. You can easily make your templates to work with our program. Here are the simple steps: Type in Open and…

  • Tutorial #5 in the HydraCALC manual explains how to use HydraCALC-Sizer to automatically build a grid based on some simple inputs. The grid it builds is ready to be AutoPeaked. Aside from that, how does AutoPeaking work in HydraCALC? And what is AutoPeaking? NFPA-13 Section 22.4.4.4 addresses gridded systems. It states that the designer must…

  • HydraCALC is set up to use either a city supply or a pump. There is currently no provision to choose use a tank or cistern specifically, but there is a way to do it none the less. From a Customer: I have a 42 foot tall water tank. How do I use this supply in…

  • From a customer: I updated my HydraCAD and I set my workspace as current but every time I open HydraCAD it opens with HydraCAD Standard.  I have been in the customize area and set my personal cui as current but it doesn’t start up with that. How do I make it show up every time?…

  • An easy to view list of all H-Factor topics can be found on our index page at H-Factor Index For technical questions, please email support@hydracad.com

  • From a customer: Is there a way to edit the length of multiple riser nipples at once? Answer: If they are a Specified Length, then yes. Type in CL to launch the Change Length command. Check the Filter a Specific Block to do many RNs at one time If they are Computer Generated, then just…

  • In order to calculate certain foam systems, a Darcy-Weisbach calculation must be done, as opposed to a Hazen-William one. This was touched on in this older blog post: Darcy-Weisbach Who? The following are numbers found in the technical data sheets of a particular brand of foam concentrate. Notes are added to illustrate which numbers go where.

  • If you have trouble with AutoCAD and uninstall it and reinstall it, you may still be getting the same errors and wondering why. This is because uninstalling AutoCAD does not remove all the ‘crumbs’ left behind. These crumbs can get in the way of a good AutoCAD reinstall. There are a number of pages on…

  • Say you want to have European Standard fittings selectable in HydraCALC. You pick Utilities / Alter Pipe and Fittings to bring up the pipe tables and see they are already created, but you wonder why they don’t show up. The reason is there is no Short Name assigned to them. HydraCALC does not have every…