British Fluid Power Association

Last updated
British Fluid Power Association
AbbreviationBFPA
Formation1959
Legal status Non-profit company
Purpose Hydraulic and pneumatic businesses in the United Kingdom
Location
Region served
UK
Membership
c. 220 including distribution and manufacturing companies
President
J Serkumian
Main organ
BFPA Executive Committee
Affiliations CETOP European Fluid Power (Comité Européen des Transmissions Oléohydrauliques et Pneumatiques)
Website BFPA

The British Fluid Power Association is a trade association in the United Kingdom that represents the hydraulic and pneumatic equipment industry, utilising properties of fluid power. [1]

Contents

History

It started in 1959 as AHEM, becoming BFPA in 1986. A division of the organisation, the British Fluid Power Distributors Association (BFPDA) was formed in 1989.

Structure

It is based in Chipping Norton in Oxfordshire, just off the northern spur of the A44 in the north-east of the town. There are three types of membership: Full, Associate and Education.

Function

It acts as a marketing organisation (mostly abroad) for the industry and collects industry-wide statistics. Its technical committees also help in implementation and origination of standards for the BSI Group.

It represents companies involved with:

See also

Related Research Articles

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Hydraulics is a technology and applied science using engineering, chemistry, and other sciences involving the mechanical properties and use of liquids. At a very basic level, hydraulics is the liquid counterpart of pneumatics, which concerns gases. Fluid mechanics provides the theoretical foundation for hydraulics, which focuses on the applied engineering using the properties of fluids. In its fluid power applications, hydraulics is used for the generation, control, and transmission of power by the use of pressurized liquids. Hydraulic topics range through some parts of science and most of engineering modules, and cover concepts such as pipe flow, dam design, fluidics and fluid control circuitry. The principles of hydraulics are in use naturally in the human body within the vascular system and erectile tissue. Free surface hydraulics is the branch of hydraulics dealing with free surface flow, such as occurring in rivers, canals, lakes, estuaries and seas. Its sub-field open-channel flow studies the flow in open channels.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Shock absorber</span> Mechanical component

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pneumatics</span> Branch of engineering

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fluid power</span>

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hydropneumatic suspension</span> Pneumatics

Hydropneumatic suspension is a type of motor vehicle suspension system, designed by Paul Magès, invented by Citroën, and fitted to Citroën cars, as well as being used under licence by other car manufacturers, notably Rolls-Royce, Bmw 5-Series e34 Touring, Maserati and Peugeot. It was also used on Berliet trucks and has more recently been used on Mercedes-Benz cars, where it is known as Active Body Control. The Toyota Soarer UZZ32 "Limited" was fitted with a fully integrated four-wheel steering and a complex, computer-controlled hydraulic Toyota Active Control Suspension in 1991. Similar systems are also widely used on modern tanks and other large military vehicles. The suspension was referred to as fr:Suspension oléopneumatique in early literature, pointing to oil and air as its main components.

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A fluid coupling or hydraulic coupling is a hydrodynamic or 'hydrokinetic' device used to transmit rotating mechanical power. It has been used in automobile transmissions as an alternative to a mechanical clutch. It also has widespread application in marine and industrial machine drives, where variable speed operation and controlled start-up without shock loading of the power transmission system is essential.

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Directional control valves (DCVs) are one of the most fundamental parts of hydraulic and pneumatic systems. DCVs allow fluid flow into different paths from one or more sources. DCVs will usually consist of a spool inside a cylinder which is mechanically or electrically actuated. The position of the spool restricts or permits flow, thus it controls the fluid flow.,

Electro-Hydrostatic actuators (EHAs), replace hydraulic systems with self-contained actuators operated solely by electrical power. EHAs eliminate the need for separate hydraulic pumps and tubing, because they include their own pump, simplifying system architectures and improving safety and reliability. This technology originally was developed for the aerospace industry but has since expanded into many other industries where hydraulic power is commonly used.

Fluid deforms continuously on the application of shear stress, no matter how much small is it. Fluid comprises both gases and liquid. The technique of using liquid for power transmission is called as hydraulics while which uses gases for power transmission is called Pneumatics. In most hydraulic systems, mineral oils will be used while in most pneumatic systems, atmospheric air will be used.

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References

  1. "About". British Fluid Power Association. Retrieved 2023-01-19.