Unsaturated or wet steam – the type used in many heat transfer and power generation applications – is neither liquid nor gas. It’s a combination of both, which makes steam flow rather difficult to measure. Most flow meters are designed for either liquids or gases. They can’t measure steam flow accurately, and that has always been a problem for anyone needing to perform steam measurement.

For the team at FLEXIM the challenge was irresistible. They put their deep expertise to work and today FLEXIM offers a steam measurement solution alongside the various portable and clamp-on ultrasonic flow meters that they have developed and brought to market.

A History of Innovation

FLEXIM was founded by technologists who believed they had a better answer to the challenge of fluid flow measurement. The clamp-on ultrasonic flow meter and associated signal processing technology they developed solved many of the problems of competing methods.

The market, which is every industry and business that needs to measure fluid flow, saw the advantages, and FLEXIM was launched on a growth trajectory.

Many businesses founded on an innovative idea let continuing development effort slide while they focus on sales. That’s not the FLEXIM way. Improvement and innovation are part of the company culture, and this extends beyond product functionality to product quality and even service quality. FLEXIM’s leaders, scientists and engineers are constantly searching for ways to improve and expand the solutions they offer.

Product Innovation

A broad patent portfolio shows the extent of the ongoing research and development activities within FLEXIM. These lead to more accurate, higher performing products that solve application challenges. Two examples of novel applications are:

Dry steam is a gas and its flow are readily measured by an appropriate flow meter. In practice though, steam is rarely dry. There’s almost always a proportion of liquid water in the gas, which makes it “wet” steam.

Wet steam velocity can be measured with a range of technologies. However, none can give a good measurement of mass flow rate. FLEXIM’s team of scientists and engineers has now solved this problem with a combination of specially engineered ultrasonic transducers and proprietary signal processing algorithms.

Nuclear power plants use immense quantities of water and steam. Accurate flow measurement is essential for both safety and reliability, but off-the shelf transducers don’t perform well in radioactive environments. Signals are subject to wide ranging errors and lifetime is limited.

To address this, FLEXIM has developed clamp-on flow meters incorporating radiation-hardened transducers. For a nuclear plant advancement of this type significantly reduces downtime, which means substantial cost savings.

Innovation in Product Quality

FLEXIM wasn’t the first company to offer a clamp-on flow meter. However, they were the first to offer one that delivered accuracy and dependability over a wide range of operating conditions and in many different applications.

To quote a FLEXIM representative serving the US states of Oklahoma and Arkansas, “Early versions of clamp-on meters made by other manufacturers were unreliable and cumbersome.” This company has represented FLEXIM since 2014 and is quick to note the superiority of the measurement technology.

Another representative said, “Back in 2004, there seemed to us to be mostly bad ultrasonic hardware in the industrial market,” but after testing a FLEXIM product, “It occurred to us that FLEXIM really seemed to know how to build a transducer.”

Reinforcing this point, the president of a subsequent representative company said of FLEXIM, “they offered products with leading edge technology and significant growth potential.”

Innovation in Service Quality

The FLEXIM team consistently strives to go above and beyond in terms of the service provided. To this point, the president of a Northeast FLEXIM representative company in the US has a story to tell. “We started representing FLEXIM 13 years ago. … The biggest surprise was the Intensity, Vision and Resources that FLEXIM put in front of us. … We were told what markets to attack. We were given talking points and a history of success. We were given new methods. … If we needed loaners or demos, they would be there. If we needed people, they would be there.”

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Innovation-Driven Success

FLEXIM never stands still. Product innovation opens new markets, while an intense focus on product and service quality ensures customer satisfaction and repeat business. Thirty years of innovation has seen FLEXIM grow to a 400+ person business. What might the next 30 bring?