Prevention of water hammer through control of the closing time, in automated hydraulic valves

One of the greatest challenges we face when calibrating automatic systems in irrigation and aqueducts is the high speed of the electric actuators; it reduces the speed of response of the valves in terms of opening and closing to a few seconds. These sudden closures in the line of conduction promote waves inside the pipe that produce overpressures that may generate damages in the aqueduct. The present work is intended to offer an alternative approach to control and prevention of water hammer, by means of the analysis of the relationship between the closing time of the valve, in a conduction with positive slope; the respective increasing in the piezometric line, and how both can be regulated by calibration in the filling speed of the upper chamber of the hydraulic valves. To verify the results, the work shows a case study of a hydroponic greenhouse project that operates with automatic irrigation, where the valves closing time was calibrated by the filling control of the upper chamber of the hydraulic valves.