Background

Check valves are sometimes needed to help move flow in the directions required. There are check valve elements available in later versions of WaterGEMS, WaterCAD, and HAMMER, but the simplest method for adding a check valve is change the properties in a pipe.

Note: Pumps in WaterCAD and WaterGEMS have built in check valves, so it is typically not necessary to place a check valve on a pipe directly connected to a pump.

Solution

As mentioned above, there are check valve elements available in later versions of the products. This element is more typically used in Bentley HAMMER, as there are transient properties to define how the valve opens and closes. If you are using Bentley WaterGEMS and Bentley WaterCAD, the simpler method to add a check valve is to change the pipe properties.

To add a check valve, you set the pipe property field "Has Check Valve?" to True. This is done by opening the pipe properties grid or the pipe FlexTable and changing the attribute.

Once this is done, a check valve symbol will be added to the pipe.

Depending on the model, there may be cases where the check valve orientation is facing the wrong way. That is because the direction of the check valve is dependent on the start and stop node for a pipe. The check valve will allow flow from the start node to the stop node, but not the other way. If the orientation is wrong, you can easily switch the start and stop nodes for a pipe in the pipe properties.

To do this, open the pipe properties. Find the attribute "Node Reversal" and click the cell. Then select the ellipsis (...) button. This will switch the start and stop nodes and the orientation of the check valve.

If you need to make changes to the orientation of a lot of pipes, this support solution will be useful.