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Overview Equipment Drawing The Methods of Level Measurement Glass Level Gauge - Transparent Glass Level Gauge - Bicolor Glass Level Gauge - Reflex Glass Level Gauge Magnetic Level Gauge Bubble Type Capacitance Type D.P. Type Diaphragm Type Float Type Displacer Type Paddle Type

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Vibration Type (Tuning Fork) - Condition Unit For Vibration Type (Tuning Fork) - Drawing of Vibration Type (Tuning Fork) Radio Active Type NON-CONTACT TYPE - Ultrasonic Type - Radar Type Tank Gauging System ( T.G.S. ) How To Selection Comparison Table References

The surface of a liquid is the interface between the liquid and some other medium, usually gas or vapor or sometimes, another liquid. The engine oil and gas tank gauges of automobiles are shiny examples of liquid level measurement devices. The measurement and control of liquid level is essential in a process plant, where a wide variety of liquids are handled in both batch and continuous processes. The accurate measurement of level is important for environmental protection (for example, tank over flow to drains), plant safety, product quality, and inventory control. Almost all liquid level devices measure according to the position or height of the liquid above a zero or lowest point, or the hydrostatic (or head) pressure.

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Measuring Principle: One principle of hydraulics is that, liquids that are contained in interconnected spaces find a common level, if there is enough liquid. This principle applies to the sight (or gauge) glass. A sight glass is a device that is connected to a tank in such a way that the liquid level in the tank can be seen through the glass.

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They are very common in the process industry. Sight glasses are usually installed with shutoff valves and a drain valve, mainly for maintenance purposes, repair and replacement.

Application: Liquid

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This instrument consists of a metal body, machined to have an internal chamber and one or more front windows (on each side of the gauge). On each window a special high resistance plate transparent glass is applied with sealing joint and metal cover plate hold by bolts and nuts.

SPR

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Fluid level indication is the result of the different transparency property of the two media (i.e. liquid and air or vapor). In some case (i.e. for water / steam) the best reading is obtained by conveying upwards on the surface of separation (liquid/steam or vapor interface), a source of light, located on the back of the gauge, the rays of which are totally reflected down to the observer.
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When in operation, bicolor level gauge shows to the observer port holes lighted green in the water zone and port holes lighted red in the steam zone. In case of long glass gauge, the window appears part green and part red. This result is obtained exploiting the following optical principle: different colors (in this case: red and green) have a different index of refraction when passing obliquely through different media (in this case: glass, water and steam).

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For the purpose, the gauge body has a trapezoid section with glasses placed on the non parallel faces. An illuminator with special red and a green filters is fitted on the gauge at the opposite side with respect to the observer. This special illuminator conveys light through the filters obliquely to the back glasses of the level gauge. Said filters allow crossing only to red and green rays. Such colored rays reach, through the
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back glass, the media inside level body. When the gauge contains steam, green rays are considerably deviated and prevented from emerging by the observer side; then only red light, whose rays are smoothly deviated by steam, passes through the whole internal hole, reaching the observer. Conversely when rays find water, red rays are considerably deviated and lost inside the internal part of level gauge, green rays can reach the front glass and seen by the observer.
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This instrument consists of a metal body, machined to have an internal chamber and one or more front windows (on one side only of the gauge). On each window a special high resistance plate reflex glass is fitted with sealing joint and metal cover plates hold by bolts and nuts.

SPR

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Reflex level gauges working principle is based on the light refraction and reflection laws. Reflex level gauges use glasses having the face fitted towards the chamber shaped to have prismatic grooves with section angle of 90. When in operation, the chamber is filled with liquid in the lower zone and gases or vapors in the upper zone; the liquid level is distinguished by different brightness of the glass in the liquid and in the gas/vapor zone. The reflex level gauges do not need a specific illumination: the day environmental light is enough. Only during the night an artificial light must be provided.
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Liquid Zone:
This zone appears quite dark when the gauge is in operation and lighted as above said.

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Gas/Vapor Zone: This zone appears almost silver bright to the observer. As for the liquid zone, the light rays reach the glass/gas-vapor interface with an angle around 45.
Since this angle is greater than glass/gas-vapor critical angle, the rays are not refracted , but totally reflected making 90 turn, thus reaching the nearest glass/gas-vapor interface again with angle of 45. For same reason they will be reflected and turned by 90 towards the observer, to whom the zone will appear silver bright.
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Measuring Principle:
Its principal based on magnetic property. A float containing a magnetic is placed inside a sealed chamber, the float is free to move and rises and falls with liquid level. Outside of chamber, there is small steel wafer which are free to rotate 180. They are painted with two different color, usually one side green and over side is red.

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As the float moves, its magnet causes the wafer to rotate, so the level surface will be indicated by the one of wafer side.

Application:
Liquid

I R

G D

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Measuring Principle:

If an open-ended tube is submerged in the liquid, a constant air flow is injected into it, and its pressure is regulated at a value slightly greater than maximum head of the liquid in the tank, air pressure in the system will be equal due to the hydrostatic head of the tank liquid at any level because any excessive pressure will bubble air out at the bottom of the tube.
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This system is also called a purge system because air or some other gas (such as nitrogen), is continuously bubbling from the bottom of pipe keeping the liquid out. It is very well suited to measuring the level of corrosive liquids, viscous liquids, or liquids that contain entertained solids.

Application:
Liquid

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Measuring Principle: A metal ( and insulated ) probe in a silo or tank and the tank or silo wall itself act as the two plates of a capacitor. The capacitance of this capacitor depends on the medium between the probe and the wall. When only air is present, i.e. the tank or silo is empty, the capacitance of the capacitor is low.

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However, the capacitance will increase when part of the probe is covered with the product. The change of capacitance is converted through an amplifier into a relay action or an analogue output signal.

Application:
Liquid , Granular Solids.
SPR I G

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Measuring Principle:
In this method the principle is based on the measurement of the hydrostatic pressure produced by a column of liquid of a given height. The pressure is calculated using formula : P = h. .g in which : P = pressure h = height of the liquid column

G = acceleration due to gravity ( constant at a certain place )

= relative density
SPECIFIC GRAVITY
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From this formula it can be seen that if the specific gravity of the medium does not vary, the only variable in the formula will be the height h.
The pressure measured will therefore be directly proportional to height h, the level of the liquid in the tank. Application: Liquid
SPR
I R G D

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Measuring Principle:
Detects the force exerted by the process material against the diaphragm

Application:
liquid , solid in silos.

Strain Gauge

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Measuring Principle:
A floater with different shape (ball float, cylindrical float) move up and down due to level moving. The round float, which contains a small magnet and move upwards a tube. In the tube one or more reed relays are placed. The reed relays will switch as the (magnetic) float passes by.

Application:
Liquid
I G

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1.Magnetically coupled switch 2.Torque tube 3.Flexible disc 4.Spring balanced

Measuring Principle:
Its operation is based on Archimedes principle which states that the force produced by a submerged body which is equal to the weight of the fluid
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it displaces. Also , the interface measurement could be done by this method.

Application:
Liquid

INTERFACE
SPR

I R

G D

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Measuring Principle: The moment of inertia of a rotating paddle changes depending on whether the paddle is in air or in contact with a product. A paddle mounted on a shaft projecting into the silo is driven by a small synchronous motor through a reduction gear. When the vane encounters resistance from the product, the rotating drive system supported on bearings will move.
I G

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Two micro switches positioned to detect this movement will change over. When the product no longer exerts a resistance against the paddle, the drive mechanism will return to its original position and one contact will restart the motor, while the other will indicate the change in level.

Application:
Solid
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Measuring Principle: The damping of a vibrating fork by changes in mass will cause a frequency shift in the vibrating element. The system consists of a two tines mounted on a membrane with a natural resonance of approximately 120Hz (tuning fork principle).
Two piezoelectric crystals are mounted on the membrane. One of these crystals is driven by a 120Hz oscillator, causing the system to resonate when the tines are not covered by the product.

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Due to this free vibrating the other crystal gives a signal with the same frequency. When the product produces a damping effect on the system, the second crystal will no longer product the resonance signal and the amplifier will switch. Because relatively little energy is needed to dampen the resonance frequency, a tuning fork level switch (Soliphant) is capable of detecting levels in products with very low relative density, i.e. 20kg/m3.

Application: Solid
D R G

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Signal transmission: The intrinsically safe signal input of the limit switch is galvanically isolated from the power supply and signal output. The condition unit powers the tuning fork measuring sensors with a twowire DC loop and receives a frequency which signals whether or not the limit has been reached. The power supply is superimposed with the current pulses (PFM signals) from the measuring transmitter.

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The pulse width is approximately 200 s and a current strength of approximately 10 mA.

Signal evaluation: The condition unit evaluates the frequency and switches the output relay for the level alarm. The relay switching state is displayed by a yellow LED on the front panel of the condition unit.
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30 315

90 270

225

150

180

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Measuring Principle: There is one source for sending ray. Usually ALPHA,BETA and GAMMA are used as a ray. The other hand, one point of detector receive rays directly from source (without any change) and another points will receive rays that some of them are absorbed by material. The different between two amount is proportional with level of surface. Application:
Liquid , Solid
I

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Measuring Principle: Short ultrasonic pulses in the range of 35KHz up to 70KHz are emitted to the product surface and then reflected received by the transducer. The time from emission to respection of the signals depends on the level in the vessel. Application:
Liquid , Solid
d=c*t/2 c: speed of light L=E-d
I R G D

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Measuring Principle: Radar use electromagnetic waves typically in the K-band or Xband (6~28 GHz). Tow basic principles of operation exist for continuous level radar transmitters and gauges.

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1.Frequency modulated carrier wave (FMCW) : The time of flight of the reflected single is measured by controlling the sensor oscillator so that it sends out a linear frequency sweep at a fixed bandwidth and sweep time.

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2. PULSE : The sensor transmits a pulse of microwave energy and receives a return signal from the material level surface. The transit time of signal is calculated and used to determine the distance to the level surface.

Application: Liquid , Solid

INTERFACE

G D

SPR

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Measuring Principle:
The most important application of radar is tank gauging system some pressure transmitter and multi-stage temperature transmitter are applied and all of outputs enters in to one processing module or one computer equipped with manufacture's software for calculate a real level measurement and then its transmitted to central control room.

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Item

Description Type

Gauge

Switch

Transm.

Interface

Non- Contact Type

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14

Bubble Capacitance Conductive Displacement Diffrential Pressure Float Glass Magnetic Paddle Radiation Radar Ultrasonic Vibrating Weighing

P P P

P P P P P P P

P P P

P P P P P P P P P P P

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- ENDRESS + HAUSER LEVEL HANDBOOK - LIPTAK, B.G. PROCESS MEASUREMENT & ANALYSIS, 4TH EDITION, CRC PRESS, 1995. - ANDREW, W.G. APPLIED INSTRUMENTATION IN THE PROCESS INDUSTRIES, 2ND EDITION, GULF PUBLISHING COMPANY, 1979. - http://www.cesare-bonetti.it

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SG = SG =

LIQUID

WATER AT STANDARD CONDITIONS

GAS

AIR AT STANDARD CONDITIONS

T = 60 OF , 15.6 OC P = 14.696 PSI , 101.325 KPa

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The operating principle of strain gauges is more than 100 years old, and was discovered when Lord Kelvin reported that metallic conductors subjected to mechanical strain exhibited a corresponding change in electrical resistant. These units are called unbounded wire gauges because the wire elements are mounted on a mechanical frame whose parts can move in relation to each other, causing a change in wire tension as load changes. Therefore, the change in electrical resistance is a measure of strain.

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Strain gauge transducers can be built by using unbounded wire elements that are stretched between a fixed and a moving point on an elastic pressure sensor. These devices are sensitive, but fragile and vibration sensitive.

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A wire filament is attached to a test specimen by plastic cement and the strain in the wire is measured in terms of its resistance. Constantan, nichrome, platinum or Karmatype alloy wires, foils, or semiconductor materials can be permanently bonded to the strained surface. Such strain gauge designs are inherently unstable due to temperature sensitivity, and hysterics caused by thermo elastic strain.

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The diffused semiconductor strain gauge, which consists of resistance elements diffused into a single silicon chip. The silicon wafer acts as the sensor diaphragm, reducing both the size and the cost of the sensor. The silicon wafer is more reliable than the metal Diaphragms because after being strained it returns to its original shape due to its excellent elasticity. The sensitivity of semiconductor-type strain gauges is 100- fold greater than that of wire strain gauges. The thickness of the wafer determines the pressure range of the sensor. Standard units are available from 0-1 to 0-250 PSIG, but they are most often used on instrument air service ranges of 3 to 15 PSIG. These sensors are small, inexpensive, accurate, and repeatable, and they provide a wide pressure range and a strong output signal level. Their limitations include sensitivity to ambient temperature variations, which can be compensated for in the intelligent transmitter designs.
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A further improvement is the thin film strain gauge that eliminates the need for adhesive bonding . The gauge is produced by first depositing an electrical insulation (typically a ceramic) onto the stressed metal surface, and then depositing the strain gage onto this insulation layer. Because the thin film gage is molecularly bonded to the specimen, the installation is much more stable and the stressed force detector can be a metallic diaphragm or beam with a deposited layer of ceramic insulation.

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Interface level control is maintaining the level between two immiscible liquids having different specific gravities. Occasionally there is need in a process to control such an interface in a vessel. The displacement level method is used for such applications. It becomes obvious that the difference in specific gravity of two fluids determines the change in force as the interface level changes through the float range.

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One of the unique capabilities of RF level measuring instrumentation is to indicate and/or control an interface between two immiscible liquids, each having a different dielectric constant. Oil/water interface measurement is a common application of this type. It is important to note that a vertically-mounted electrode must be fully submerged at all times to provide correct interface detection. If it isnt, the electrode will be exposed to two interfaces; the first being between air or a gas and the upper phase material, and the second being between the low and high dielectric constant liquids. The zero is calibrated when the probe is completely submerged in the low dielectric constant liquid. The 100% point is established using the span adjustment when the entire electrode is submerged in the high dielectric constant liquid. In the oil/water example, as the interface rises on the electrode, a greater percentage of it is submerged in the higher dielectric constant liquid. This causes an increase in the capacitance generated and a corresponding increase in the output signal.

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