Who Should Use Feed Forward Control? What applications are best for Feed Forward?

It’s not uncommon for process control discussions to focus on use of the PID to improve a loop’s ability to track Set Point. Oftentimes tweaks to controller tuning parameters either seek incremental reduction in Settling Time or strive to limit Overshoot. Indeed, many PID tuning courses position optimization of a control loop’s Set Point Tracking as the ultimate goal. Such a bias overlooks the value of other strategies like Feed Forward Control.

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The Relationship Between Loop Performance Monitoring and Loop Tuning

Imagine that you just purchased software to help with the tuning of your plant’s control loops.  You’re ready to enhance control and to improve production throughput and efficiency, right?  With software successfully installed you consider the 100s if not 1000s of PID controllers regulating your facility’s processes.  A question now comes into focus: Where do you start?

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When Profits Are Hidden in Plain Sight

If you drive a car, then you probably benefit from McGard’s products.  Their proprietary lug nuts keep automobile tires where they belong – on your car.  In fact, McGard is the nation’s leading manufacturer of mechanical anti-theft devices.  When market demand outpaced McGard’s production capacity they focused their attention on existing production lines.  With the help of PlantESP the engineering team at McGard successfully tapped into opportunities that had been seemingly hidden in plain sight.

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Is the Harris Index Right for Your Loop Assessment Needs?

Predicting the weather is difficult – just ask a meteorologist. Even with the help of advanced analytics few seem to get it right with consistency – just ask any parent who has dealt with an unplanned snow day. In addition to more advanced tools meteorologists rely on basic measures such as Temperature, Wind Speed, and Atmospheric Pressure. Their continued reliance on these simpler metrics provides food for thought.

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Data Collection Speed is Key to the Accurate Interpretation of Process Dynamics

If you’re old enough to remember silent movies, then you know what it’s like to see the characters seemingly jiggle around the screen. Black spots would randomly appear as the story was told with the help of subtitles. Spots and subtitles aside, these movies appeared jittery due to their slow speed. The slow frame rate – a precursor of data collection speed – resulted in visual gaps.

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Using Percent Time in Normal to Uncover Tuning Issues

Even Simple Metrics Such as Percent Time in Normal Reveal Issues that Negatively Affect Performance and Signal the Need for Controller Tuning

It’s easy to get tripped up if a shoelace is untied. Just ask any child. While that’s a lesson most learn early in their lives each of us can occasionally slip up and find ourselves at risk.

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