  The magnetic flow meter is one of the best possible choice for the
measurement of flow rate of liquid metals in fast breeder reactors. Due to the
associated complexities in the measuring environment, theoretical evaluation of
their sensitivity is always preferred. In order to consider the 3D nature of
the problem and the general flow patterns, numerical field computational
approach is inevitable. When classical Galerkin's finite element formulation is
employed for the solution, it is known to introduce numerical oscillations at
high flow rates. The magnetic field produced by the flow induced currents
circulate within the fluid and forms the source of this numerical problem. To
overcome this, modified methods like stream-line upwind Petrov-Galerkin schemes
are generally suggested in the allied areas like fluid dynamics, in which a
similar dominance of advective (curl or circulation) component occurs over
diffusion (divergence) component. After a careful analysis of the numerical
instability through a reduced one dimensional problem, an elegant stable
approach is devised. In this scheme, a pole-zero cancellation approach is
adopted. The proposed scheme is shown to be absolutely stable. However, at
lower flow rates numerical results exhibits small oscillation, which can be
controlled by reducing the element size. The source of stability at higher flow
rates, as well as, oscillations at lower flow rates are analysed using
analytical solution of the associated difference equation. Finally the proposed
approach is applied to the original flow meter problem and the solution is
shown to be stable.
