Testimonials & Success Stories

In designing a pump targeted to the mining and dairy slurry industries, we learned that more radical designs, such as a very high head, two vane impeller, absolutely require a transient analysis in order to produce accurate results. The speed of PumpLinx enabled us to perform full transient simulations over-night, with the result that original design point was achieved and bettered by about 15 feet, and the efficiency was around the anticipated 78%. By comparison, the steady-state predictions, which can only approximate the effects of dynamic pulsations, were well off the mark. Had we made the decision to go with either of the other two CFD packages we looked at, transient simulations would have not been feasible, and, as the designer, I would still be in a funk and scratching my head. What I hope is that, during your sales efforts for this software, you will share this anecdote and stress, while it works much of the time, a steady-state analysis, alone, might very well leave a designer scratching his head!

Bill Carnes P.E.

Chief Engineer

Pioneer Pump, Inc.

A cavitating inducer, impeller, and volute is quite a challenging problem to simulate. PumpLinx easily handled this difficult problem. It is critical to use a code that is validated and robust, so that performance differences in prototype designs can be discerned. PumpLinx is extremely robust, and provides hydraulic performance in both cavitating and non-cavitating environments. I would highly recommend PumpLinx for pump analysis applications.

Dr. Edward Bennett

Director of Fluid Engineering

Mechanical Solutions, Inc.

There are many CFD tools to choose from; however, there is no doubt that PumpLinx is the perfect CFD tool for pumps. Hyundai successfully uses PumpLinx for the analysis of cavitation and pressure fluctuation in its fluid power systems, and specifically, its pumps and valves. PumpLinx is impressive because it is able to simulate transient fluid dynamic effects for automotive pumps; plus, I am very satisfied with the cavitation modeling capabilities of PumpLinx. It is uniquely suited to deal with very small gaps where cavitation can occur. I look forward to utilizing PumpLinx even more in the future as new developments are released.

Tae-Gyun Kim, Research Engineer

Corporate Research & Development Division

Hyundai-Kia Motors

Since we started using Pumplinx in 2008, we have been able to start using extensively CFD calculations for Positive Displacement pumps such as vane, gerotor and external gear pumps.What we find great with Pumplinx is the capability to set-up a complex model very quickly (including CAD model clean up, import into Pumplinx, meshing and set-up) and be able to get results for a transient analysis in a few hours. This allow us to use the software not only for new projects development but also for troubleshooting. We did validate Pumplinx with our test-bench data and found that it is very accurate both for global quantities prediction and for local effects like cavitation damage. Overall, we are very happy with the software because it helps raise our department productivity and improve the quality of our work.

Raffaele Squarcini

Calculation & Simulation Department Manager

Pierburg Pump Technology

The Powertrain Control Research Laboratory (PCRL) is a research group in the Department of Mechanical Engineering, College of Engineering at The University of Wisconsin-Madison. We are using PumpLinx to evaluate preliminary changes to new hydraulic pump designs for a unique high-speed application. This software allows us to identify the most promising changes, given our goals. PumpLinx clearly indicated the cavitation and pressure effects of numerous modifications to the pump housing and gears. Development utilizing simulations decreases the design time by negating the need to test each design via a prototype thus severely limiting the required time. Each prototype that is not required for testing eliminates approximately $2,000 toward the development cost.The GUI is simple to use and a single general approach is required to apply a proper mesh and the appropriate set-up parameters. The time required to set up a simulation is approximately 30 minutes. The support provided by Simerics is excellent, top notch, professional, and prompt.

Powertrain Control Research Laboratory,

Department of Mechanical Engineering

University of Wisconsin-Madison

“Due to complexities of interaction among gears and crescent-shaped island, a crescent oil pump is one of the most difficult auto components to model using three dimensional CFD. The present study shows that the proposed computational model is very accurate and robust and can be used as a reliable crescent pump design tool.”

Magna Powertrain, Engine Technologies Group, Concord Ontario acquired the simulation software PumpLinx in 2006 to support its oil pump development team whose main responsibility is the design of gerotor and vane pumps. The team has proved that the code provides accurate results with the pre-processing/setting time reduced to as low as two hours using the PumpLinx templates and the automatic mesh generator. Simulations were performed in a short period of time which allowed us to compare three or four design options back to back and to make the best possible decision before building the prototypes. PumpLinx was very useful in addressing issues related to cavitation discovered in the first stage design. The cavitation was either eliminated or reduced to a minimum in the second stage design. Overall, PumpLinx has proved to be a very useful, user-friendly tool designed especially for pump designers to help them make the best possible design decisions to meet or exceed the customer expectations.

Romulus Crisan, P.Eng.

Magna Powertrain FEA Engineer, Engine Transmission Components Group

800 Tesma Way, Concord, ON, L4K 5C2

“ …comparison between Fig. 8 [ PumpLinx Predictions] and Fig. 7 [Sauer Danfoss image of cavitational wear on a Piston Pump Endcap] proves a very good agreement between observation during test and result from CFD-simulation.”

I'm pleased to let you know that CFD engineers in my section at Transmission & Driveline Engineering (TDE), Ford Motor Company have been successfully using the CFD package, PumpLinx, developed by your company to support the transmission oil pump design and release. We found that PumpLinx is easy–to-use, fast, and very robust in creating pump virtual models to predict the flow performance exhibited in gerotor and vane pumps. The applications of PumpLinx have effectively helped us eliminate many technical bottlenecks and increase our analysis throughput. We are thrilled about the opportunity to support our engineering team to investigate more design alternatives and sort out potential design weaknesses analytically. I can see that in a shorter term, the final design of our pumps will be more robust, the concept decision will be made faster in response to system demands. In a longer term, I expect that we will be able to translate many innovative ideas of pump designs to positive customer perception of the superiority of our vehicles' NVH quality.

Best Regards,

Chin-Yuan Perng Supervisor,

Dynamics CAE & VSA ATEO, Ford Motor Co.

I just wanted to let you know how pleased I have been with the Pumplinx CFD code. I’ve been using the code now for about 6 months to provide fluid flow and heat transfer analysis for my primary client, and this tool has exceeded my expectations. Although originally designed for pump analysis, I have found the code to be exceptionally well suited for the analysis of valves, which in my case included the accommodation of cryogenic fluids and multi-phase flow. Having used other CFD codes in the past, I was expecting a steep learning curve and a lot of down time to be able to get the results I needed. Instead, I found Pumplinx to be easy to use, well thought-out, robust, and fast. In addition, I have found the technical support from Simerics to be superb. My questions and difficulties were answered quickly and effectively, usually the same day. This turned out be especially important for the analysis I was doing, which required considerable interaction with the client.The overall capability and utility of Pumplinx has allowed we to provide excellent analytic support to my clients, and I plan on using this code as my primary CFD tool.

John A. Bossard, Ph.D.,

President BSRD LLC