A working trilingual reference of industrial pump terminology — Portuguese, English, Spanish — written for engineers, buyers, and translators who need to navigate pump documentation across Brazilian, North American, and Latin American suppliers.
Every entry has:
- The term in PT / EN / ES
- A precise definition
- A "why it matters" or "common gotcha" note
- A link to the relevant standard or pump-engineering reference
This is not a translation table. It is an opinionated reference written to catch the places where literal translation produces engineering errors.
CC BY 4.0 — copy, adapt, redistribute with attribution to FB Bombas.
- Hydraulic fundamentals — flow, head, NPSH, BEP
- Pump types — centrifugal, gear, axial, lobe, diaphragm
- Mechanical seals and shaft sealing — single, dual, packing, magnetic drive
- Materials and corrosion — cast iron, duplex, hastelloy, elastomers
- Standards and certifications — API, ISO, ANSI/HI, NFPA, NBR
- Drivers, controllers, and instrumentation — VFDs, soft starters, ATS, pressure switches
- Failure modes — cavitation, recirculation, dry-running, water hammer
Total: ~60 terms across the seven sections. Each section is self- contained — read in any order.
Most pump glossaries are translation tables. They translate "centrifugal pump" to "bomba centrífuga" and stop.
The problem: Brazilian, Mexican, and Argentine engineers use the same words for subtly different concepts — and getting those distinctions wrong creates real engineering errors.
A few examples we cover:
- "Cabeça" vs "altura manométrica" vs "head": All three are used interchangeably in casual Portuguese, but ABNT prefers "altura manométrica" and "head" is the international term. In a contract, pick one and be consistent.
- "Selo mecânico" vs "vedação mecânica": Both appear in Brazilian practice but ABNT NBR 13929 standardized "vedação mecânica" — most vendor catalogs still use "selo mecânico". Either is acceptable in technical writing; "vedação" is more correct.
- "Cavitación" (ES) vs "cavitação" (PT): Same phenomenon, but the Spanish term sometimes gets translated to English as "caving in" instead of "cavitation" — a category error.
- "NPSH disponible / disponível / available": All correct. But the abbreviation "NPSH-d" appears in some Spanish-language contracts; "NPSHa" is the international convention.
This glossary explicitly notes these distinctions where they matter.
FB Bombas — Brazilian industrial pump manufacturer in Cabreúva, São Paulo, since 1944. Trilingual catalog covering centrifugal, gear, thermal-oil, and fire-fighting pumps for Brazilian and Latin American markets.
The full FB Bombas trilingual glossary lives at:
- Portuguese:
/glossario - English:
/en/glossary - Spanish:
/es/glosario
This repository is a curated subset — the terms most useful for cross-language procurement, specification, and technical translation.
CC BY 4.0. Copy, adapt, redistribute with attribution to FB Bombas.
Spotted a translation error? A regional usage we missed? Open an issue or PR. Brazilian, Argentine, Mexican, Chilean, Colombian, Peruvian regional usage all welcome — note your regional context.
All knowledge-base sites are hosted on GitHub Pages and licensed under CC BY 4.0 (or CC BY-ND 4.0 for the manuals mirror).
pump-engineering-handbook— Open knowledge base on industrial pumping fundamentals — centrifugal, gear, thermal-oil, fire-fightingnfpa20-fire-pump-checklist— 47-item NFPA-20 / NBR-16704 fire-pump compliance checklistpump-procurement-playbook— Industrial pump procurement playbook — RFQ, TCO, contract clauseslatam-pump-buyers-guide— Country-by-country LATAM procurement guide — Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Perufb-bombas-technical-manuals— Official FB Bombas technical manuals (PDF) — FBCN, FBE, FBEI, FBOT
Canonical FB Bombas: www.fbbombas.com.br · Manuais técnicos