Koolance FM17 Quickly Tested

[Vapor]

This was more to satisfy my own curiosity....but I wanted to quickly test the Koolance FM-17's accuracy against calibrated Dwyer flowmeters.

In use were Dwyer RMC-142 and -144 flowmeters (connected in series to essentially make a .2 to 7GPM flowmeter).

Flow is adjusted by varying pumping power (I have 4 pumps in this circuit, two of which are on variable controllers). The Dwyer data points are my best attempts at reading the readout and interpolating between the marks (when necessary). The Koolance FM17 data points are averages of 1 minute data logs (so really short considering a normal test for me is 75+ minutes). RPMs are logged with my CrystalFontz 633.

Here's the chart I made....



The two flowmeters basically read identically below 2GPM and above that only differ a little bit....the biggest flaw with the FM-17 is that above like 1.8GPM, it's little spinny-thing is spinning very fast and the granularity of readouts decreases. Maybe if it measured over a period of like 10 seconds rather than 1 second, or if the polling rate of the sensor were increased, it would increase accuracy at the high-end of the flowrate spectrum. Other than that, it's a pretty sweet $30 toy and surprisingly accurate (I really was shocked by it). It seems to be really low restriction as well, which is a plus.

Nevertheless, it's getting semi-retired and putting into duty as a passive measurement tool rather than something I use for data acquisition.

[skinnee]

thats pretty accurate for a $30 flow meter... not bad at all.

[Edward88]

Nice performance.


Is the fm17 flow killer?

[Kibbler]

Nice performance.


Is the fm17 flow killer?

umm

It seems to be really low restriction as well, which is a plus.

[Ketzer7]

He just wanted to make absolutely sure

[MpG]

In use were Dwyer RMC-142 and -144 flowmeters (connected in series to essentially make a .2 to 7GPM flowmeter).

You mean parallel, right?

[Vapor]

No, I connected one after the other....that's series.

I use the -142 for .2 to 2.2GPM and then the -144 for when the flowrate goes above 2.2gpm.

How the heck would parallel flowmeters even work (especially when they're different)?

[Ketzer7]

Not that this is probably something you want to spend your time testing given other more important topics and pieces of gear, but I wonder how the Aquacomputer flow sensor compares and holds up.. Been thinking about getting one or two of those to go with an aquaero.

Shoggy, where are you? Would you consider sending Vapor a flow sensor to test and compare? Would you be up to trying it Vapor?

[Vapor]

You nailed that on the head. I have had two of them fail on me in a two week period. Alas, they are not exactly high quality items. For $30 each I did not expect them to be good quality, but I did expect them to last at least a few months, not a single week each. Mind you, I fill my loop with distilled water, nothing that should make a flow meter fail in there.

I'd love to get myself a better flow meter. I even checked out some nice low-end vortex counting flow meters with no moving parts that have solid state pulse outs. Alas, the TMS-200 software doesn't currently have provision to permit entering custom pulse rate multipliers for non-Koolance flow meters. I hope they add such a feature soon! In the mean time, I'm running blind without a flow meter.

Sucks that they failed....did they stop spinning or electrical malfunction or what?

Mine's been going for a few months now and has taken some physical, electrical, and flow abuse....still seems to work fine. I've only used mine with distilled + PTnuke-PHN or distilled + killcoil.

Do any of those flowmeters have a fan header with pulse output (similar to how the FM-17 works for those of us that don't have a TMS-200)? You could at least use the software to monitor the "fan RPMs" of the flowmeter if you want to just monitor your loop's flow. Heck, you could use an on-board header for that...though you'd have to run even more software

Not that this is probably something you want to spend your time testing given other more important topics and pieces of gear, but I wonder how the Aquacomputer flow sensor compares and holds up.. Been thinking about getting one or two of those to go with an aquaero.

Shoggy, where are you? Would you consider sending Vapor a flow sensor to test and compare? Would you be up to trying it Vapor?

I'd make a review out of that if given the opportunity.... wouldn't take more than an evening of work I'd imagine (this test only took 25-30min).

[Vapor]

Which way do you have it oriented? IIRC, point it directly upward was a no-go for me at anything other than really high flowrates (it was getting stuck against the end).

What flow meters are you thinking of? I'm always looking for new toys to play with and might pick one up if they look enticing enough

[Vapor]

I guess I could see how the spinner could get jammed against the mid-body structure if it were pointed downward + had flow forcing it downward. Not sure what to say there

Mine has always been horizontal...just the way that's been easiest for me, no real reason. Maybe that's the key to long-term usage? Hopefully it works and continues to work for you horizontally

[MpG]

No, I connected one after the other....that's series.

I use the -142 for .2 to 2.2GPM and then the -144 for when the flowrate goes above 2.2gpm.

How the heck would parallel flowmeters even work (especially when they're different)?

My bad, I misread Dwyer's data, read the -143's range instead of the -144's, and thought you were trying to use two flowmeters to extend the maximum range up to 7gpm.

Actually, a related question - are your two flowmeters quiet in operation? I've got a -143, and it rattles like an SOB at pretty much any flowrate. Considering I grabbed it used off ebay for cheap, I'm thinking it's probably just defective.

[Vapor]

None of my 4 Dwyers are remotely quiet (2 are used, 2 are new)

It's not defective...it's what happens when the float doesn't have a guidepole. I thought the noise would go away when the loop was fully bled, but it didn't.

EDIT: what happened to all of astrodanco's posts? He posted a few times in this thread

[BDW88]

I use 3 FM-17's in my build hooked up to 2 Big-NG's and they work flawlessly thanks for taking the time to test them!