The simple PLC ladder diagram (LD) commands consist of contacts and coils, arranged in sequences that mimic…
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Imagine a major marathon race, where hundreds of runners gather in one place to compete. When the starting gun…
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A flow switch is one that detects the flow of some fluid through a pipe. Flow switches often use…
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A level switch is one detecting the level of liquid or solid (granules or powder) in a vessel. Level switches…
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Feedback Control System Components Before we begin our discussion on process control, we must define a few key…
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The efficient identification and correction of instrument calibration errors is an important function for…
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A laser is a light source emitting waves of light that not only share the exact same frequency (color)…
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Volumes could be written about poor diagnostic technique. The following mistakes are not intended to comprise…
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Any conductor possesses a characteristic called inductance: the ability to store energy in the form of a…
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A Safety Instrumented Function, or SIF, is one or more components designed to execute a specific…
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Temperature measurement devices may be classified into two broad types: contact and non-contact. Contact-type…
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Disconnect Switches Disconnects are switches designed to isolate sections of a power system in case of damage…
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Up until this point, we have explored various types of instrumentation diagram, each one making reference to…
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Disturbances in the liquid tend to complicate liquid level measurement. These disturbances may result from…
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When control valves operate between fully open and fully shut, they serve much the same purpose in process…
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RTDs are completely passive sensing elements, requiring the application of an externally-sourced electric…
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As described earlier in this chapter, calibration refers to the adjustment of an instrument so its output…
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Those familiar with industrial instrumentation will find much within the electric power industry remarkably…
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There are several different methods useful for causing an AC induction motor to brake, or slow down: DC…
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Solids tend to expand when heated. The amount that a solid sample will expand with increased temperature…
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A chemical reaction resulting in a net release of energy is called exothermic. Conversely, a chemical reaction…
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The electrical conductivity of liquids is an important analytical measurement in many industrial processes.…
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Perhaps the most important rule of controller tuning is to know the process before attempting to adjust the…
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The following animation shows a rotating phasor in three-dimensional form. The phasor rotates in a complex…
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In contrast to quantitative tuning procedures where definite numerical values for P, I, and D controller…
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“Feedforward” is a rather under-used control strategy capable of managing a great many types of…
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Diagnostic ability is arguably the most difficult skill to develop within a student, and also the most…
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The two “process variables” we rely on most heavily in the field of electrical measurement and…
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An important legacy technology for all kinds of continuous measurement is the self-balancing system. A…
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Programmable logic controllers are essentially nothing more than special-purpose, industrial computers. As…
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(Will be addressed in future versions of this book)
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Capacitive level instruments measure electrical capacitance of a conductive rod inserted vertically into a…
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A very common method for directly controlling low flow rates of fluids is to use a device known as a metering…
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To show a practical process example, let’s examine three diagrams for a compressor control system,…
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Thermodynamics is the study of heat, temperature, and their related effects in physical systems. As a subject,…
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The disadvantages of pneumatic instruments are painfully evident to anyone familiar with both pneumatic and…
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A fluid is any substance having the ability to flow: to freely change shape and move under the influence of a…
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A much simpler alternative to continuous vibration sensors (displacement or acceleration) and monitoring…
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The following animation shows how a radio-energy pulse travels down and then up the waveguide of a guided-wave…
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Those familiar with industrial instrumentation will find much within the electric power industry remarkably…
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In modern industry, the most popular form of field-level signal transmission for variable industrial…
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All masses require force to accelerate (we can also think of this in terms of the mass generating a reaction…
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A bridge circuit is basically a pair of voltage dividers where the circuit output is taken as the difference…
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Regulating the electric power sent to an electric motor is a task performed by high-speed switching…
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A simple control system drawn in block diagram form looks like this: Information from the measuring device…
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The disadvantages of pneumatic instruments are painfully evident to anyone familiar with both pneumatic and…
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A variety of technologies exist to measure the quantity of stored material in a vessel. For liquid…
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Calculus has a reputation for being difficult to learn, and with good reason. The traditional approach to…
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A design-based fortification is one rooted in technical details of system architecture and functionality. Some…
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A limit switch detects the physical motion of an object by direct contact with that object. An example of a…
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Learning PLC programming is a very important skill. If your job involves programming, then you will likely…
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Perhaps the most important rule to obey when using pneumatic instruments is to maintain clean and dry…
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Layer 1 of the OSI Reference Model is where we define the “physical” elements of a digital data…
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The following animation shows how the “rotating” magnetic field of a three-phase AC induction…
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A very simple device used to measure pressure is the manometer: a fluid-filled tube where an applied gas…
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All substances are comprised of various elements in various combinations and proportions. Elements may thus be…
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The Law of Mass Conservation states that matter can neither be created nor destroyed. The Law of Energy…
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Although it seems each model of PLC has its own idiosyncratic standard for programming, there does exist an…
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Some of the simplest types of digital communication networks found in industry are defined by the EIA…
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When I began teaching full-time in 1998, most of what I thought I understood about good teaching was actually…
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