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Calibration Standards to Produce and Measure Physical Quantities

Calibration Standards to Produce and Measure Physical Quantities

As previously defined, calibration refers to the checking and adjustment of an instrument so that its output…


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Electrical Sources and Electronic Load

Electrical Sources and Electronic Load

By definition, a source is a device delivering energy into a system, while a load is a device extracting…


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Digital Multimeter (DMM) Tips and Tricks

Digital Multimeter (DMM) Tips and Tricks

The digital multimeter (DMM) is quite possibly the most useful tool in the instrument technician’s…


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Troubleshooting Current Loops

Troubleshooting Current Loops

A fundamental principle in instrumentation system troubleshooting is that every instrument has at least one…


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The Difference Between Series and Parallel Circuits

The Difference Between Series and Parallel Circuits

In addition to Ohm’s Law, we have a set of rules describing how voltages, currents, and resistances…


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Fluorescence Measurement

Fluorescence Measurement

When a high-energy photon strikes an atom, it may eject one of the lower-level electrons from its shell,…


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Introduction to Protective Relaying

Introduction to Protective Relaying

Circuit breakers used in residential, commercial, and light industrial service are self-tripping devices: they…


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Input/Output (I/O) Capabilities of PLCs

Input/Output (I/O) Capabilities of PLCs

Every programmable logic controller must have some means of receiving and interpreting signals from real-world…


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Level Sensor Accessories

Level Sensor Accessories

Disturbances in the liquid tend to complicate liquid level measurement. These disturbances may result from…


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Ladder Diagram (LD) Programming Contacts and Coils

Ladder Diagram (LD) Programming Contacts and Coils

In the United States, the most common language used to program PLCs is Ladder Diagram (LD), also known as…


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Introduction to Optical Analysis

Introduction to Optical Analysis

Light is known to interact with matter in very specific ways, which may be exploited as a means of measuring…


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Chromatography: Methods, Detectors and Species

Chromatography: Methods, Detectors and Species

Imagine a major marathon race, where hundreds of runners gather in one place to compete. When the starting gun…


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Use of Line Reactors

Use of Line Reactors

Regulating the electric power sent to an electric motor is a task performed by high-speed switching…


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Non-dispersive Luft Detector Spectroscopy

Non-dispersive Luft Detector Spectroscopy

Non-dispersive analysis, while newer in discovery than dispersive analysis (Isaac Newton’s 17th-century…


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Understanding the “Normal” Status of a Process Switch

Understanding the “Normal” Status of a Process Switch

Perhaps the most confusing aspect of discrete sensors is the definition of a sensor’s normal status.…


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Introduction to Capacitors and Capacitance

Introduction to Capacitors and Capacitance

Capacitance Any two electrical conductors separated by an insulating medium possess the characteristic called…


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Electrical Pressure Elements

Electrical Pressure Elements

Several different technologies exist for the conversion of fluid pressure into an electrical signal response.…


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Ethernet networks: Repeaters, Cabling and Switching Hubs

Ethernet networks: Repeaters, Cabling and Switching Hubs

An engineer named Bob Metcalfe conceived the idea of Ethernet in 1973, while working for the Xerox research…


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Polyphase AC Power

Polyphase AC Power

“Polyphase” means “many phases,” describing a form of AC electrical system where…


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Electrical Sources and Electronic Load

Electrical Sources and Electronic Load

By definition, a source is a device delivering energy into a system, while a load is a device extracting…


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Numerical Differentiation

Numerical Differentiation

As we have seen, the concept of differentiation is finding the rate-of-change of one variable compared to…


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Introduction to Power System Automation

Introduction to Power System Automation

Those familiar with industrial instrumentation will find much within the electric power industry remarkably…


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Temperature Sensor Accessories

Temperature Sensor Accessories

One of the most important accessories for any temperature-sensing element is a pressure-tight sheath known as…


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AC Motor Speed Control

AC Motor Speed Control

AC induction motors are based on the principle of a rotating magnetic field produced by a set of stationary…


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Loop Diagrams (Loop Sheets)

Loop Diagrams (Loop Sheets)

Finally, we arrive at the loop diagram (sometimes called a loop sheet) for the compressor surge control system…


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Control Valve Actuators

Control Valve Actuators

The purpose of a control valve actuator is to provide the motive force to operate a valve mechanism. Both…


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What are Simple Machines?

What are Simple Machines?

A machine in the broad sense of the word is any device designed to translate some form of energy into useful…


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Supervisory Control

Supervisory Control

In a manually-controlled process, a human operator directly actuates some form of final control element…


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Safety Gas Analyzers

Safety Gas Analyzers

Process analyzers measure the concentration of specific substances for the purpose of measuring and/or…


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Thermocouple Types, Junctions, Connector and Tip Styles

Thermocouple Types, Junctions, Connector and Tip Styles

RTDs are completely passive sensing elements, requiring the application of an externally-sourced electric…


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Elementary Thermodynamics

Elementary Thermodynamics

Thermodynamics is the study of heat, temperature, and their related effects in physical systems. As a subject,…


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Pressure-based Flowmeters

Pressure-based Flowmeters

All masses require force to accelerate (we can also think of this in terms of the mass generating a reaction…


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Learn Fundamental Principles, not Procedures

Learn Fundamental Principles, not Procedures

“As to methods there may be a million and then some, but principles are few. The man who grasps…


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Periodic Table of the Elements

Periodic Table of the Elements

All substances are comprised of various elements in various combinations and proportions. Elements may thus be…


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Troubleshooting Current Loops

Troubleshooting Current Loops

A fundamental principle in instrumentation system troubleshooting is that every instrument has at least one…


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Chemiluminescence Measurement

Chemiluminescence Measurement

Recall that an exothermic chemical reaction is one that releases a net sum of energy, as opposed to an…


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Limit, Selector, and Override Controls

Limit, Selector, and Override Controls

Another category of control strategies involves the use of signal relays or function blocks with the ability…


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Resistance, Reactance, and Impedance

Resistance, Reactance, and Impedance

Electrical Resistance Resistance (\(R\)) is the dissipative opposition to an electric current, analogous to…


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Proper Care and Feeding of Pneumatic Instruments

Proper Care and Feeding of Pneumatic Instruments

Perhaps the most important rule to obey when using pneumatic instruments is to maintain clean and dry…


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On/off Shut-off Valves

On/off Shut-off Valves

An on/off valve is the fluid equivalent of an electrical switch: a device that either allows unimpeded flow or…


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Fluid Mechanics

Fluid Mechanics

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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Fundamental Principles of Industrial Instrumentation

Fundamental Principles of Industrial Instrumentation

Shown here is a partial listing of principles applied in the subject matter of this chapter, given for the…


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FOUNDATION Fieldbus H1 Protocol Segment Troubleshooting

FOUNDATION Fieldbus H1 Protocol Segment Troubleshooting

Feedback obtained from industrial users of FF reveal a common pattern: Fieldbus is a powerful and reliable…


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Gas Filter Correlation (GFC) Spectroscopy

Gas Filter Correlation (GFC) Spectroscopy

Using filter cells to eliminate wavelengths associated with interfering gases is called positive filtering in…


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