Abstract
I. North-West Local Section
Central North-West Local Section manned a stand at a recent CE&I Exhibition held for suppliers of Sellafield Ltd. The exhibition was supported by 22 suppliers, and over 140 people attended.
The exhibition was organised by Industrial Exhibitions Ltd (Companion Company) for Sellafield Ltd. It features new and novel technologies suitable for use in the nuclear industries.
Tom Nobes said, The InstMC stand was very popular and a great success. Thanks to Simon and Tony we had 9 people express a definite interest in joining the InstMC and 4 companies interested in joining as Companion Companies. We’d also like to thank Peter Baxendale of Industrial Exhibitions for donating the space at the exhibition for our stand.
Left to right: Tom Nobes (Sellafield Ltd), Simon Conway (Cavendish Nuclear) and Tony Whitlow (Whitlow Engineering) all on the Central North-West Local Section at the InstMC stand.
II. North-West Local Section
On 18 November, Graham Burns of Gas Measurement Instruments (GMI, a Tyco Company), a Companion Company of the InstMC, gave three lectures on behalf of the Central North-West Local Section.
The first lecture in the morning was at Manchester University, where over 60 students attended.
The second lecture in the afternoon was at Liverpool John Moore’s University.
The third lecture was in the evening at Yokogawa’s offices in Runcorn for ordinary members and the general public.
All three lectures were variations on the theme of flammable gas monitoring for safety purposes. These also featured alternative power sources (solar, battery, etc.) and wireless communications.
Tom Nobes (Programme Secretary) said, ‘Many thanks to Graham for his efforts on this. It’s great when industry and the institute can reach-out to local academia. The hands-on nature of this talk was a great help to the students’.
The well-known brands of GMI, Detcon, Simtronics, Oldham and Scott Safety have recently all been amalgamated as a Tyco Business.
Graham Burns of Scott Safety lectures to students at Manchester University on flammable gas detection.
III. North-West Local Section
The Institute of Measurement and Control Central (InstMC) North-West local section holds its Annual Dinner at The Palace Hotel, Manchester, on Thursday 6 October 2016 and would be delighted if you and your guests attend.
The bar will be open from 18:30 with dinner starting at 19:30. At the start of the dinner, there will be a few toasts and short speeches by the Chairman. The dinner will be a three-course meal followed by our guest speaker Justin Moorhouse. During the evening, we will be selling raffle tickets for the prizes that have been donated by various companies and the official evening is scheduled to finish at midnight with the Tempus bar in the hotel remaining open until the early hours.
During the evening, we will also be presenting prizes to students from Manchester University and Liverpool John Moores University. The students from Manchester University will be members of the winning team in the Embedded Systems Project otherwise known as the White Line Following Robot Race. The prizes for students from Liverpool John Moores will be awarded to the students who have produced the best performance in the second year Control module and the best third year project related to Instrumentation and Control.
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IV. Manchester & Chester Local Section
Manchester & Chester Local Section held its final annual dinner before merging with Merseyside Local Section to become the Central North-West Local Section. Over 350 people attended, and this was the largest and most successful dinner for 20 years. Held at The Palace Hotel in Manchester’s Oxford Road, the dinner speakers were Gareth Chilcot (ex England rugby star) and John Scott (Radio 4 comedian). InstMC President Sarah Spurgeon gave a key-note address and a Life-time Award was made to local member Tony Whitlow (ex Endress + Hauser, now Whitlow Engineering).
During the evening, they also presented prizes to students from Manchester University. The students were members of the winning team in the Embedded Systems Project otherwise known as the White Line Following Robot Race.
Caption for photos – students from Manchester University, members of the winning team in the Embedded Systems Project.
V. Surrey and Sussex Section
A. Air flow measurement – a review of problems and alternative techniques
Technical Seminar evening to be hosted by Doosan Babcock in Manor Royal, Crawley, RH10 9AD.
Tuesday 15 March 2016, starting at 6:45 p.m. Refreshments will be available.
Traditionally, Power station air flow measurements were by Venturi with Differential Pressure (DP) transmitters. As overall foot prints have reduced, it has become more difficult to use a venturi.
Balancing the combustion air and fuel gas flow into industrial boilers, fired heaters and burners are essential in order to maintain efficient and safe operation. Combustion air ducts usually have large cross sections making it difficult to achieve the required ‘straight run’ duct lengths. This creates significant measurement errors. In addition, extreme operating conditions such as high temperature and high dust-laden gas atmospheres further challenge the abilities of the measurement system.
John Grist (CEng MInstMC), from Doosan Babcock, will explain the problems encountered in using DP-based flow measurements. Typically, applications are to measure hot 350 °C and dusty combustion air flow on power stations, using venturi, aerofoil or pitot tubes. As space has reduced, Doosan Babcock has used alternative techniques, including thermal mass flow, on most Over Fire Air retrofits and some Primary Air measurements. They have also used a velocity measurement derived from time-of-flight between two capacitive probes on the complete range of air flow measurements.
John will be joined by Des Redmond from Promecon and Simon Harwood from Allison Engineering.
The Promecon system uses two probes, one 35 cm behind the other. They measure the electric current induced by charged particles passing nearby to the antennas, which is caused by the dust in suspension. Promecon use a cross-correlation technique to measure the time-of-flight between the two probes. The volumetric flow is calculated from the velocity and duct area.
The Alison Engineering solution is based on the Fluid Components International (FCI) thermal mass flow system. Originally labelled as ‘hot wire’ anemometers and used in laboratories for velocity profile and turbulence research work, they have developed from small, fragile and impractical devices to the more rugged sensors needed for industrial applications.
If time permits, John will explain the latest advances in pitot systems and summarise the techniques discussed including SIL and redundancy capabilities.
In order to allow for three speakers, the presentation will begin at 18:45 prompt and will run to 20:30 followed by question time and a further opportunity to clear the refreshments.
Doosan Babcock is in the Crawley Business quarter, approached from Manor Royal, opposite Schneider/Foxboro. Post code is RH10 9AD and prior registration is required to clear security.
As you can see, there is considerable professional development learning to be gained from attending this tri-company, collaborative event. As always, our technical meetings are freely open for attendance to non-members and students of engineering in addition to InstMC members. We will request that all those wishing to attend to please pre-register by informing our Programme Secretary – Richard Brown – by e-mail at
An event ‘flyer’ will be e-mailed out about 1 month prior to the event date. This serves as the final confirmation and reminder of the details. That will be the time to officially register your interest in attending. In the meantime, do please send your current e-mail address details to Richard Brown so that you may be reminded about this and any other Surrey & Sussex Section event in the future.
Power station
VI. Teesside Section
A. Teesside instrumentation control and electrical exhibition success
Forty plus exhibitors enjoyed a busy day at Marton, Middlesbrough, in November. Although slightly down on attendees, perhaps resulting from the contraction of the steel industry locally, most exhibitors reported significant business opportunities. More than half of the exhibitors were InstMC Companion Companies, taking advantage of discounted stand space. The InstMC stand was also busy, with a healthy interest in membership and professional registration. Four seminars were held throughout the day which included the Ian Parry Memorial lecture. Ian, on behalf of his company, had delivered Functional Safety–related lectures at this event over a number of years. He is sadly missed.
For information on next year’s exhibition, please contact Ian Tyzack on
Exhibition
