Experimental Procedures

Identification Of Major Components In The Plant

1. Walk around the experimental equipment, identify and mark the

following major components of the system in the P&I Diagram provided
at the end the lab manual.
A. T90 AirTank
b. FE91 Orifice meter
c. FT91 Differential Pressure Transmitter, with a square root function.
D. PT91 Absolute Pressure Transmitter.
E. TE91 RTD Temperature Sensor.
F. TIT911 Temperature Transmitter.
G. FIC90 ON/OFF controller.
H. FIC91 Flow Controller (PID).
I. FCV90 Pneumatic ON/OFF control valve with Solenoid valve, TSV90.
j. FCV91 Control valve with FCY91 current-to-air (I/P) converter and
pneumatic positioner, PP.
K. FPTR91 Recorder.

Start-Up Procedures

1. The following steps constitute the start-up procedure. Go through these

steps before starting any experiment.
2. Switch the "PANEL, SCADA/DDC" selector switch at the front of the
cubicle to "PANEL,SCADA"position. Switch ON the main power supply
at the front of the cubicle. All the panel instruments will lit up.
3. If any annunciator gets activated, press the ACKNOWLEDGE button
to silence the buzzer.
4. Set the instrument air supply regulator to the pressure indicated at the
air regulators at the pneumatic control valves FCV90 and FCV91. Purge
if there is any condensed water in the air regulators.
5. From the process air supply, trace the two pipelines, PLI and PLII as
follows:
 Pipeline I (PLI):
AR900-MV900A-T90-MV900D-PLI-FI911-TE911-FE91/FT91-FCV91-
FCV1-VF
Pipeline II (PLII):
AR900-MV900A-T90-MV900D-PLII-FCV90-PG902-V

Open fully the pipelines PLI and PLII at their various manual valves.
Close fully the manual by-pass valve around the control valve FCV91
and the ON/OFF control valve FCV90.
7. The pipeline PLI has two discharge manual valves, VF and MV901.
Open the vent VF and close the valve MV901.
8. Make sure the valves MV900A and MV900D are open and valves
MV900B and MV900C are shut.
9. Place the panel controller FIC91 in the Manual (M) mode. Make sure
the control valve positioner PP is connected (i.e. Not by-passed).
10. Open fully the control valve FCV91 by setting the MV of FIC91 to
-6.3%.
11. Shut fully the manual valve MV900A and set AR900 to the pressure
indicated at AR900.
12. Adjust the manual valve MV900A till the air flow rate is about 50
kg/hr (Read the flow rate from PV of FIC91).
13. Step (10), (11) and (12) have set the process air supply pressure and
flow rate. DO NOT re-adjust AR900 and MV900A hereafter.
14. Check that vent valve and bottom drain valve of vessel T90 are shut.
Set MV = 106.3% at FIC91 to fully shut the control valve FCV91.
15. Check control valve FCV91 (in the plant) is fully shut and FI911
reads the air volumetric flow rate as ZERO. Also check the mass flow
rate Fm at FIC91 is ZERO.
16. Now set the MV = 50% at FIC91 and check control valve FCV91 (in
the plant) is 50% opened. 17. Note the variables that are recorded in each
channel of the recorder FPTR91.
Red Pen - Mass flow rate (kg/hr)
Green Pen - Volumetric flow rate (m3/hr)
Blue Pen - Temperature (oC)

Control Of Air Flow System

1. If your are starting this experiment in a new session, then go through

the start-up procedures given in Section 3.2.
2. With FIC91 in Manual (M) mode, open the control valve FCV91 fully
with MV = -6.3%. (For confirmation, check the stem position indicator of
control valve FCV91. FCV91 is an Air-To-Close (ATC) valve)
3. With FIC91 still in Manual mode, adjust its setpoint, SV = 25 kg/hr.
4. Access the PID parameters of FIC91 and set the first (I) PID trial
values: PB = 200%, TI = 6 s, TD = 0 s
5. Start the recorder chart drive by pressing “RCD” pushbutton at
FPTR91.
6. Switch FIC91 to Auto (A) mode and watch the recorder response (i.e.
air flow response) until the air flow (red pen) is fairly steady.
7. Introduce a pulse disturbance by quickly opening and shutting fully the
by-pass valve around control valve FCV91. Observe the response till it
becomes fairly steady.

Pid Controller Tuning

1. Set FIC91 in Manual (M) mode with setpoint SV = 25 kg/hr. Adjust

the PID values to the following: PB = about 100%, TI = 9999 s
(Maximum), TD = 0 s (Minimum). By setting TI to maximum value
and TD to minimum value, we can eliminate these two modes in a PID
controller (use PB only).
2. Adjust MV in FIC91 until the PV value closes to the setpoint SV value
(SV = 25 kg/hr).
3. Transfer FIC91 to Auto (A) mode. Introduce a setpoint pulse
disturbance as follows:
i) Set increase SV to 28 kg/hr
ii) Hold the value for a few seconds
iii)Bring back the SV to 25 kg/hr
4. Observe the mass flow rate (red pen) response. Repeat the Closed Loop
Tuning Method as above with a decreasing PB value until uniform
oscillation (constant amplitude) is observed. (To increase oscillation,
decrease PB value and vice versa).

5. Examine the chart response for the uniform oscillation. New PID value
from tuning procedures can be obtained as follows:

i) PB corresponds to uniform oscillation = PB* ultimate (correspons to

ultimate gain, Kcu)
ii) Distance between two adjacent peaks = Tn* ultimate (ultimate period,
Pu) Tn* can be calculated from this formula:

Tn *(sec s) = (measurement(mm)× 3600) / chartspeed(500mm hr)

iii) The approximate PI controller settings by using Ziegler Nichols

formula are:

PB = 2 x PB*, TI = Tn*/1.2

6. To test this new PI controller settings, set this value into FIC91 (in
Auto mode). Perform the test with a pulse disturbance. Increase PB value
to damp the oscillation and fine tune the PB and TI values to get as close
to Quarter Amplitude Damping response.

Shutdown Procedures

1. Stop the recorder chart by pressing”RCD” pressbutton at recorder

FPTR91.
2. Switch FIC91 to Manual mode with MV = 0%.
3. Switch off the main power supply.
4. Shut off the process air supply at AR900. 5. Shut off the instrument air
supply