14:03 Nov 26, 2011 

In many years of using orifice plates to measure flow, I have never heard these referred to, at least in English, as "resistors". Similarly for "thermal resistance".

13:55 Nov 26, 2011 

I feel that "resistor" is when to comes to talking of an element and "resistance" when you talk about the quality or conditions.

12:49 Nov 26, 2011 

"résistance" does (or can) mean "resistor" when applied to electrical circuits, I feel the more abstract "resistance" is appropriate here. They generally take the form of a carefully machined knife-edge orifice, and their purpose is to restrict the flow of fluid to as to create a pressure difference which can be measured and hence used to infer the rate of flow.