Company Profile

Displacement Meters: Heavy-Duty Volumetric Mechanical Meters for Oil Transfer

Quick Answer: Silver Automation Instruments heavy-duty volumetric mechanical meters for oil transfer handle DN15 to DN150 lines. Expect ±0.2 percent of reading accuracy for fuel oil, lube oil, heavy crude, and diesel, with a mechanical totalizer and optional 4-20 mA HART output. Send us your oil viscosity, pipe size, flow range, and pressure for a quote.

Oil transfer metering works better with direct volume measurement. A positive displacement meter traps a known oil volume between rotating gears and counts each pass. The total shows on a mechanical register. Because the register is mechanical, it works at truck loading racks, fuel depots, and barge offloading points without external power.

Silver Automation Instruments supplies heavy-duty volumetric mechanical meters for oil transfer in Southeast Asia, the Middle East, Africa, and Latin America. Common sites include marine fuel transfer skids, lubricant blending lines, crude oil loading terminals, and diesel storage depots.

Why Positive Displacement Meters Fit Oil Transfer

Turbine meters lose accuracy when oil viscosity shifts. A positive displacement meter does not. It measures volume directly, so a change from 5 cSt diesel to 380 cSt heavy fuel oil does not change the pass volume. Here is the thing. Most engineers skip this part. The mechanical tolerances set the repeatability, not the flow profile.

For oil transfer, repeatability is often more important than absolute accuracy. A repeatability of ±0.05 percent helps a terminal operator detect batch differences and avoid billing disputes. We recommend oval gear positive displacement meters for clean oil products. Crude oil with wax or sand should use a 40 to 60 mesh Y type strainer on the inlet line.

Silver Instruments positive displacement flow meters cover 0.5 m3/h to 400 m3/h. Sizes go from DN15 to DN150. Pressure ratings start at PN16 and go to PN40 or PN63 for crude oil truck loading and high pressure fuel injection lines.

Heavy-Duty Mechanical Meter Construction

The body is available in cast steel, aluminum, or 316 stainless steel. Cast steel suits most fuel oil and heavy crude applications. Aluminum works for low pressure diesel and lube oil. Stainless steel handles corrosive oil blends, contaminated fuels, and marine air.

Internal gears come in hardened steel, cast iron, or PPS with ceramic bearings. For heavy fuel oil at 120 °C, choose cast steel and hardened steel gears. For light diesel at ambient temperature, aluminum with PPS gears is enough. Specify viscosity and temperature when you request a quote. This changes internal clearance and bearing selection.

Mechanical totalizers are standard. They show total volume in liters, m3, gallons, or barrels. Field operators can read the dial without a laptop. The meter also has a pulse output from a reed switch or Hall effect sensor. You can connect that pulse to a batch controller, PLC, or remote terminal unit.

Viscosity, Temperature, and Sizing

These oval gear flow meters handle 1 cP to 100000 cP after viscosity calibration. Light diesel meters at 3 cP. Heavy fuel oil at 50 °C may be 380 cSt. Some vacuum bottoms reach 50000 cP at 80 °C. Meter size changes because high viscosity oils need a larger internal clearance to avoid pressure drop and gear wear.

Last year a customer in Vietnam transferred 40 m3/h of heavy fuel oil on a DN80 line. Viscosity was 380 cSt at 50 °C and line pressure was 12 bar. A DN80 cast steel oval gear meter with hardened steel gears and a mechanical register handled the service. The 4-20 mA HART output went to the depot PLC for remote logging.

Standard meters suit -20 °C to 150 °C. For heavy oil that solidifies below pour point, use a heating jacket on the meter body. The jacket keeps oil above pour point