Abstract
Water meter measuring errors vary depending on the water flow rate. The difference between water actually consumed and registered by a meter will differ depending on how water consumption is distributed by flow rates. Published studies assessing the performance of new residential meters have only analysed the error curves of the meters without calculating the influence that consumption patterns have on their field performance. In most cases, research has been limited to analysing compliance with published standards. This work presents an evaluation of the actual commercial losses to be expected considering the consumption characteristic of domestic users. Several types of residential meters have been tested and the error curves obtained have been combined with measured consumption patterns of domestic users. As a result, this paper provides information about the order of magnitude of the initial measuring error as a function of the residential meter model and user characteristics.
