Decoupling Level Flow Process Control

• Main Author: Abu Mansor, Masyanti
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: Universiti Teknologi Petronas 2006
• Subjects: TP Chemical technology
• Online Access: http://utpedia.utp.edu.my/6893/1/2006%20-%20Decoupling%20Level%20Flow%20Process%20Control.pdf; http://utpedia.utp.edu.my/6893/

This Final Year Research Project (FYRP) which entitled "Decoupling Level Flow Process Control" is purposely done to model level and flow process using step test and several set of experiments. Data extracted from the experiments were used to build process models and were simulated in the MATLAB simulink since it is the most appropriate software that can model the process. In order to achieve themain objectives of the project which is to design the decoupler as well as reducing or eliminating the interactions, some calculation involves in the decoupler design stage. As a requirement to the project, some modifications have been done on the equipment involved. From the experimental works, transfer function for level process, flow process and interaction between level and flow process could be obtained, hi the simulation, the trial is divided into three parts namely openloop process, closed loop with PIDprocess and closed loop withPID plus a decoupler process. All the responses were analyzed to compare the effectiveness of the decoupler. Based on the result, it is shown that the level will deviate in a great amount if step change is applied in an open loop process. However, the deviation decreases as the conventional PID controller is introduced in the process. As expected, with the presence of decoupler, the result will bebetter since the decoupler helps the controlled variable to be as close as possible to the desired set point. It is also observed that the performance of the decoupler is better as the flow rate increases as well as at higher gain of the interaction process; in other words, the decoupler works best for strong interaction process. The objectives specified for this project have been successfully achieved within the time constraint given. Further research could be made to observe the performance of the decoupler in the industries.