Section5 5.

SystemIntegration
Process Control: Loop p Tuning g and Analysis y

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Understand the process

Why does this process exist? What are the Safety, process, and quality constraints? How does this process relate to the main product being produced? What would happen if it were bypassed? What are the cost impacts of this process? What are the quality impacts of this process? How does it impact on other loops? Does the SP remain constant? How fast are disturbances?

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Understand the process

Review P&IDs Consult with: process engineers instrument technicians operators Look for the fundamental reasons for this part of the process process. Does it exist to: reduce variation? blend? change the product?
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Understand the process

You may find that there are conflicting descriptions of the process objectives. This is paydirt! Get everyone together and have a discussion about the real process objectives. Gaining alignment on the purpose of the process will quite often resolve all kinds of other operating problems.

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Top 20 Mistakes

Greg McMillan and Stan Weiner, two of the worlds great authorities in the field of process control control, list the top 20 mistakes made in the field of process instrumentation.

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Mistake No. 1

Control valve pressure drops that are not engineered.

Most of the valves in your plant end up being oversized oversized. This is accentuated by the tendency for the mechanical, process, and instrument engineer to each put in some excess capacity and then choose the next larger size size.

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Mistake No. 2
The use of on-off valves for control valves.
The primary culprits of the supposed transition from on-off to throttling are rotary valves. Taking a ball or butterfly valve, slapping a rack and pinion or scotch yoke piston actuator and a spool type positioner and calling it a control valve will create lots of repetitive cycles and questions like what is wrong. Also beware of names that mean the opposite. For example, the high performance isolation valve is really the lousy performance throttling valve because the high sealing friction and shaft windup p cause excessive stick-slip. p Remember that tight shutoff means high friction.

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Mistake No. 3
The placement of differential head or insertion type (e.g. vortex, annubar, thermal mass) flow meters downstream of the control valve.
It screws up the velocity profile and the next performance review of y you and y your meter. Yet websites, newsletters, and books have this arrangement proudly displayed as a logo for process control.

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Mistake No. 4
Recalibration as the solution to instrument problems.
This gives the appearance of doing something. The real problem is usually associated with the operating conditions, application, or the installation. For example, example the orifice could be worn worn, the steam tracing could have boiled out the liquid in the sensing lines, connections could be plugged, condensate could have collected in sensing lines and the composition and any of the physical properties lines, (density and viscosity) could have changed.

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Mistake No. 5
Tight control of level in a surge tank.
The purpose of this volume was to absorb changes in flow and for the level to roll with the punches. Keeping the level within a few per cent of set point passes them on and defeats the purpose of the tank tank. Most oscillations in a process can often be traced back to an over zealous person tuning a level controller and an excessively tight set of low and high level alarm limits limits.

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Mistake No. 6

Hydro test and flush of control valves and instruments.

This is a good idea if you want to see how tight a person with a wrench can make the valve packing; whether the vendor really meant the pressure over range limit, or whether your valve trim, insertion meter meter, or electrode can withstand welding rods and pipe wrenches travelling at 3 m/s.

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Mistake No. 7

Equalization lines without a purge or tracing.

It is i not t a case whether h th you view i the th line li as h half lf f full ll or h half lf empty. You need to choose full or empty and then install a purge or h tt heat tracing i t to guarantee t it. it Trusting technicians to periodically empty or fill lines is an exciting exercise in wishful thinking. Vapours will condense and fill up an empty line, or changes in pressure and temperature will empty a full line at the least opportune times.

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Mistake No. 8
The over use of differential head meters to measure flow.
Orifices stink. To use them for mass flow, borders on the absurd. Apparently, ppa e y, engineers e g ee s a are e ob oblivious ous to o measurement easu e e noise, o se, poor rangeability from the square root relationship, the shift in meter coefficient with wear and Reynolds number, the change in density with composition, and the seven leak points. There are too many better choices with less noise, more rangeability, and better long term accuracy and reliability, such as Coriolis, Coriolis magnetic flow flow, and vortex meters meters. Insertion versions are available for large pipelines.

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Mistake No. 9

The installation of temperature p sensors in baffles.

This is a good idea if you want a smooth and gradual response in temperature while your reaction runs away. The insertion of sensors in baffles coated with g glass or full of cigarette butts and sand makes trends so slow you will think you are in the Caribbean.

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Mistake No. 10
The over-use of thermocouples for control.
If you like to adjust set points to compensate for drift and increase trend display scales to flatten f out noise and scatter, dont want to use derivative action, then save the $200 and go with the thermocouple (TC). Just tell the process engineer the TC is faster and stronger than the RTD, and dont mention that it is inside a thermowell whose design dominates the time response and reliability of the installation. Be sure to save an extra $800 by omitting the smart transmitter and take the TC directly y into a DCS. Just remember to set the trend compression high to make the A/D noise disappear and turn off the rate action.

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Mistake No. 11

The use of anything other than the most simple, reliable, and accurate measurements. measurements
If you pride yourself on your intelligence and creativity and are into extreme sports while on the job, go for the most exotic and complex instruments and analysers you can dream up up. Forget about Coriolis density meters. They are just too accurate and reliable to be anything but b i after boring ft they th are installed. i t ll d Instead pick an analyzer that likes a well heated, ventilated, and air conditioned environment.

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Mistake No. 12

Installation of pressure gauges and electrodes before startup. This is a great idea if you have stock in these companies. Just think of all the gauges and electrodes that get busted during construction and water batching batching.

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Mistake No. 13

Steam tracing left on during the summer.

This is great for conducting chemistry experiments, such as how hot does the process fluid need to get before its gets sticky, solidify, or polymerize. Also, it provides a good check on sensor temperature ratings and safety programs for technicians to wear gloves.

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Mistake No. 14
The use of field mounted switches. This is lots of fun if y you like to g guess the trip p settings, g , especially for field pressure and temperature switches. Limit switches on valves may be unavoidable but make sure they are encapsulated and have no mechanical components. The higher amp rating of other types doesnt do you much good d if th they get t hung h up or corroded. d d Just remember that limit switches, which are designed to tell y you if a valve has failed, fail more often than the valve.

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Mistake No. 15
The use of home-made instruments, analysers, and algorithms. g
The use of special fabricated or designed stuff instead of off the shelf standard solutions is exciting for the innovator but not for everyone e e yo e e else se who o has as to o suppo support o or use it. The testing is prejudiced and the documentation is nonexistent, but dont let this stop you. After all that next promotion or graduate degree may just be one special instrument or algorithm away.

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Mistake No. 16

The placement of all your eggs in one basket. Not N t a good d id idea unless l you are bi big or stupid t id enough ht to absorb the loss. The placement of interlocks or control system that can disable an entire plant in one computer or controller or on one power supply or circuit is risky business.

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Mistake No. 17

The use of too much integral action (too small integral ti ) in time) i reactor t and d column l temperature t t controllers. t ll Integral has no sense of direction and will only make a correction after it crosses the line much like a 90 year old driver.

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Mistake No. 18

The use of not enough derivative action in temperature and d pH H controllers. t ll

Turn off the rate in these applications and experience first hand the exhilaration from acceleration. Just make sure the trend recording shows the new highs reached by exothermic reactors or steep titration curves.

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Mistake No. 19
The omission of positioners on fast loops. The real life problems introduced by bench settings settings, high packing friction, shaft windup, high seating friction, and the capabilities and diagnostics of digital smart positioners make their omission a crime that should be punishable by a person forced to guess what the valve position is for every valve without a positioner.

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Mistake No. 20
The use of steam traps in large or critical applications.
Why not make the performance of millions of dollars worth of process equipment and instrumentation hinge on a $100 stream trap? One reason is that the use of a small vessel, , level sensor, , and controller to hold-up condensate might cost a few thousand dollars. Who cares if the stream trap p stays y shut and liquid q condensate backs up into the process equipment and reduces the heat transfer area? Who will notice if the steam trap stays open, and steam blows through to the condensate system? Engineers and operators have gotten sick to their stomach looking at the trend recordings of evaporators evaporators, reactors reactors, and columns with cheap traps.
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