The H-Factor

Reducing Entropy

Recent Posts

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

Using a Non-Standard Pipe Type in HydraCALC

A customer called today asking how to enter a 1″ black plastic underground pipe for the calc. This particular situation sounded unique enough that I did not tell him to add that pipe type to our database, as I would have if he expected to see this pipe type used repeatedly. I told him to…

September 2026
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Category: HydraCALC

  • HydraCALC has a special tool to help you figure out where in your system losses are occuring. The Graphical Pressure Display (GPD) is that tool. In order to use it, one extra step is needed – you need to fill in the column named Input Type This column specifies the role of each pipe in…

  • This was written by a coworker – Steve Downing – for a customer who had to have an answer for the AHJ as to why the equivalent lengths for C100 piping are less than those for C140: 'The fitting equivalent length modifiers were intended to keep the friction loss (Pf) thru a given size fitting…

  • One of the longstanding requests from customers has been to be able to use other than E and T for their Elbows and Tees when they AutoCalc. They may be calcing a CPVC job, so they want to use other fittings that are assigned to CPVC specific products, for example. Or they may use FireLock…

  • Say you want to add a loss curve for a new device. Here's what you do: 1. Open HydraCALC2. Pick the Utility pulldown menu and then pick Alter Pipe/Fittings3. Go to the bottom of the table and you will see other curves here (all are defined as a Z fitting)4. In the first open line,…

  • Most times, a pump is going to be used for more than one remote area. Both HydraCALC and HydraCAD/AutoCalc use the same pump input screen, and that input can be saved and recalled. Once you have your pump set up, pick the File pull down and pick Save Graph. Then, later, you can pick Open…

  • I have gotten two calls on this in the last two days, so that makes it a good blog topic. What if you have a pump and a tank, but no city supply? This one is simple: 1. End your piping with the reference point PUMP (any name will do, but be consistent) 2. Set…

  • From a Customer: I have a suggestion for your next revision: The info sheet button could have a pull down tab so that a different info sheet can be used. Quite often I will use the first calc, modify it and do a standpipe calc. The only problem is the info sheet can not be…

  • Somewhere around 2003 the internal diameters of CPVC pipe changed, based on manufacturer. Prior to 2003 our database had CPVC dimension published by IPEX Blazemaster  (.884, 1.109, 1.4, 1.602)   In 2003 we updated the database to match data published at the time by Tyco, Spears & Harvel (.874, 1.101, 1.394, 1.598) Looking online today…

  • A common request is to put your own logo on the hydraulics printout cover sheet. This is pretty easy: Note: You may have to make any sizing adjustments to your bitmap for it to fit on the cover sheet. You can use a .jpg or .png file too, just rename it to a .BMP extension…

  • Many of you know this one, but many don’t – so I will show it here. If you are entering input manually one of the fastest ways to do it is to use the ENTER key to copy input from the line above. For example, if you have a line of input that looks like…