How to Use Plant-Wide Feedforward for More Flexible and Efficient Production

The following tip is from the ISA book by Greg McMillan and Hunter Vegas titled 101 Tips for a Successful Automation Career, inspired by the ISA Mentor Program. This is Tip #101.   The pressure to reduce inventories, coupled with changing market demands and...

What are the Benefits of Identifying Deadtime and Ramp Rate?

The following tip is from the ISA book by Greg McMillan and Hunter Vegas titled 101 Tips for a Successful Automation Career, inspired by the ISA Mentor Program. This is Tip #89.   In Tip #70, we learned that deadtime was the key to loop performance. The Control Talk...

How to Determine the Health of an Industrial pH Glass Electrode

The following tip is from the ISA book by Greg McMillan and Hunter Vegas titled 101 Tips for a Successful Automation Career, inspired by the ISA Mentor Program. This is Tip #86.   There is not a whole lot of current information on the response time of pH electrodes....

How to Use an Adjustable Flow Ratio and Feedforward Summer to Optimize Flow Measurement

The following tip is from the ISA book by Greg McMillan and Hunter Vegas titled 101 Tips for a Successful Automation Career, inspired by the ISA Mentor Program. This is Tip #93.   If you look at a process flow diagram, you quickly realize that the flows are designed...

How to Use External-Reset Feedback for Cascade Control

The following tip is from the ISA book by Greg McMillan and Hunter Vegas titled 101 Tips for a Successful Automation Career, inspired by the ISA Mentor Program. This is Tip #95.   The value of the external-reset feedback feature in PID controllers is becoming...

Use Signal Characterization in the DCS to Linearize the Installed Flow Characteristic of a Valve

The following tip is from the ISA book by Greg McMillan and Hunter Vegas titled 101 Tips for a Successful Automation Career, inspired by the ISA Mentor Program. This is Tip #84.   Signal characterization to linearize valve installed flow characteristic has a bad...

How to Use Valve Position Control to Optimize Process Efficiency and Capacity

The following tip is from the ISA book by Greg McMillan and Hunter Vegas titled 101 Tips for a Successful Automation Career, inspired by the ISA Mentor Program. This is Tip #97.   There are many opportunities for process optimization by valve position control (VPC)....

How to Achieve Process Simulation Fidelity

The following tip is from the ISA book by Greg McMillan and Hunter Vegas titled 101 Tips for a Successful Automation Career, inspired by the ISA Mentor Program. This is Tip #98.   The best way to classify process simulators is to look at the original intent of the...

How to Determine the Health of an Industrial pH Reference Electrode

The following tip is from the ISA book by Greg McMillan and Hunter Vegas titled 101 Tips for a Successful Automation Career, inspired by the ISA Mentor Program. This is Tip #87.   The reference electrode should provide a fixed reference potential and a path of...

Use Middle Signal Selection to Improve pH Measurement Reliability

The following tip is from the ISA book by Greg McMillan and Hunter Vegas titled 101 Tips for a Successful Automation Career, inspired by the ISA Mentor Program. This is Tip #88. Biopharmaceutical batches are often worth more than a million dollars. The product quality...

How to Use Output Tracking to Improve Setpoint and Abnormal Condition Response

The following tip is from the ISA book by Greg McMillan and Hunter Vegas titled 101 Tips for a Successful Automation Career, inspired by the ISA Mentor Program. This is Tip #91. If you watch a good operator start up or deal with abnormal conditions, you see him or her...

How to Optimize Batch End Points and Cycle Times

The following tip is from the ISA book by Greg McMillan and Hunter Vegas titled 101 Tips for a Successful Automation Career, inspired by the ISA Mentor Program. This is Tip #96.   When I was leaving for college, my Dad said, “Make sure you use a good grain analyzer to...

What are the Benefits of Computing and Trending a Future Process Control Variable?

The following tip is from the ISA book by Greg McMillan and Hunter Vegas titled 101 Tips for a Successful Automation Career, inspired by the ISA Mentor Program. This is Tip #90.   A change anywhere in a control loop will circle the loop in one loop deadtime. Every...

Butterfly and Ball Valves with Positioners Are Not Control Valves

The following tip is from the ISA book by Greg McMillan and Hunter Vegas titled 101 Tips for a Successful Automation Career, inspired by the ISA Mentor Program. This is Tip #10.   One of the more heated arguments I had with a client involved his extreme desire to use...

How to Make Reset Time and Feedforward Action Smarter

The following tip is from the ISA book by Greg McMillan and Hunter Vegas titled 101 Tips for a Successful Automation Career, inspired by the ISA Mentor Program. This is Tip #92.   The reset time can be approximated as a factor of the deadtime, but this dimensionless...

How to Select the Best Type and Size of Actuator for Tight Control

The following tip is from the ISA book by Greg McMillan and Hunter Vegas titled 101 Tips for a Successful Automation Career, inspired by the ISA Mentor Program. This is Tip #81. Since early in my career, I have always been glad to see a diaphragm actuator rather than...

Benefits of Using Sliding Stem Valves for Tighter Process Control

The following tip is from the ISA book by Greg McMillan and Hunter Vegas titled 101 Tips for a Successful Automation Career, inspired by the ISA Mentor Program. This is  Tip #80. For pH control, where the requirements for precision are extraordinary, the reagent flow...

Why You Should Decrease PID Gain and Reset Time for Pipeline and Inline Control

The following tip is from the ISA book by Greg McMillan and Hunter Vegas titled 101 Tips for a Successful Automation Career, inspired by the ISA Mentor Program. This is Tip #78.   I quickly started to appreciate pipeline and inline control from working on inline pH...

Benefits of Increasing PID Gain and Reset Time for Vessels and Columns

The following tip is from the ISA book by Greg McMillan and Hunter Vegas titled 101 Tips for a Successful Automation Career, inspired by the ISA Mentor Program. Today’s This is Tip #77. I have found over and over again that the simplest and best thing you can do...

First Principles for a Deeper Understanding of Industrial Automation

The following tip is from the ISA book by Greg McMillan and Hunter Vegas titled 101 Tips for a Successful Automation Career, inspired by the ISA Mentor Program. This is Tip #66. The automation profession requires knowledge of thousands of details on hardware,...