PPC Coursework

To be handed in Tuesday 30th April 2019 by 15:00 – I would however recommend having completed
it (or very nearly) much sooner than this.

Please also note that the majority of the work can be done prior or post having done the lab and the
lecture course, but you may wish to revisit aspects throughout the term.

Hand in report covering at least the exercises below as a 12 A4 page report + 1 page A3 for P&ID
diagram, (Introduction to Conclusions, this means that references, front page and appendices (not
marked) are not included in the page limit). Any additional files (matlab, excel, ProII etc) should be
zipped together and uploaded to the canvas assignment, the report file must be uploaded as a
separate docx or pdf file and a physical copy of the report handed in at the ESO (education support
office). This means two files should be uploaded to the assignment the report file and a separate zip
file of any other files.

The coursework exercise includes carrying out a 1-hour investigation on the Vacuum Degassing
(VDG) lab equipment, creation of a P&ID for the equipment in the lab and development of a
multivariable control model of a process of your choice.

The SOP (standard operating procedure) for the VDG lab is available on Canvas, along with the
Chemical and General risk assessments.

During your 1 hour lab session, you will investigate the pressure and level control of an interacting
system and the impact on that system of changing key process and control parameters.

The equipment will be on and running at steady-state prior to your starting the lab, please see the
video on Canvas about the startup, general operation and shut down of the equipment. The lab is
timed assuming you are familiar with this, you don’t have time to learn all this from the
demonstrator.
In-Lab Instructions for VDG equipment.

(i) Make sure you have done the pre-lab work on Canvas. Remember you have a maximum
of 1 hour in the lab to include all set up and shut down activities.
(ii) The equipment should be running at a steady state, familiarise yourself with the
equipment – this should be straight forward given the pre-lab work.
(iii) For each of the runs below record the data collected by the PC and also make
observations of at least the speed of response, the impact on other system parameters,
the spray pattern, the air flowrate F2, the sounds, etc. Make sure you save the data at
regular intervals.

Run 1: change the pressure set point (reference value) from -0.3 bar(g) to -0.25 bar(g). It should take
ca 5 mins to reach steady state.

Run 2: change the level set point (reference value) from 300 mm to 250 mm. Allow to reach steady
state.

Run 3: change both the pressure set point and the level set point as close to instantaneously as you
can from -0.25 to -0.30 for the pressure and 250 to 300 for the level.

Run 4: For the level controller only, set the integral (was 0.25) and derivative (was 0.05) control
settings to 0 and change the gain, K to 5 (was 2). Change the level set point from 300 to 280. Leave
to reach steady state once reached, change the level set point back to 300. Allow to reach steady
state.

Run 5: change the level controller back so the integral and derivative control are reinstated. After 3
minutes turn the pumps off.

Coursework Write up instructions:

(i) present key findings on multivariable control of the VDG equipment as

recorded/observed during your experiment, pay particular attention to the potential
impact in an industrial setting. (30%)
(ii) a process flow diagram with key control aspects is shown in the prelab documentation
(figure 5), develop this into a P&ID (process and instrumentation diagram) and present
on one sheet of A3. (20%)
(iii) select a multivariable control problem, develop a model for its operation and then
investigate its controlled response. (50%)