CET1713

Instrumentation & Process Control

Spring 2016

Homework 3
Due date: January 8, 2016
Q 1. Consider a system of two interacting tanks with areas A1 = 40cm2 and A2 = 60cm2 , respectively.
The steady state flow (Fss ) is 60 LPH, height in the first tank (h1,ss ) is 12 cm and the height in
the second tank (h2,ss ) is 6 cm.
(a) Obtain the transfer function between the height in the second tank and the inlet flow.
(b) What dynamic regimes (underdamped, critically damped, overdamped) are possible for an
interacting tank system?
(c) Find the overall damping coefficient of the system.
(d) If the sequence of the tanks is reversed (A1 = 60cm2 , A2 = 40cm2 ), compute the damping
coefficient.
(e) If the tanks were non-interacting, assuming that all the other parameters to be the same,
compute the damping coefficient.