level measurement

Where do you get your product information?

In today's current economic condition, we have all found it necessary to seriously assess every potential expenditure and decide whether or not it is absolutely necessary. As Product Manager for Monitor, advertising expenses fall into my realm of responsibilities. In my previous position, I knew that the price of print advertising was high, but I did not know it was as expensive as it actually is. I realize print advertising is necessary and I have no intention of eliminating it at this time like one of my competitive colleagues is considering.  Consequently, I have reduced both the frequency and size of our printed ads and have put substantial effort into other resources that are not nearly as expensive and some actually have no relative cost at all.

Having said all of that, I would greatly appreciate a quick response from you telling me where you go or what media you use to research level measurement and level sensing equipment.

• Do you use magazines or other print media an if so, which?

• If you use the Internet, which search engine(s) do you use?

• Do you regularly participate in any Social Media sites such as Facebook, Twitter, etc?

• Do you rely upon Manufacturer Representatives or Distributors?

• Do you subscribe to Powderandbulk.com or similar site?

I look forward to your responses and I thank you for your time.

Greg DeRudder

Technorati Tags: Level measurement basics bin level indicator level control

Digital Cameras are a relatively inexpensive and indispensable diagnostic tool.

Those of us that have played the Tech Support Game for any length of time have at some point been in a situation where neither the caller seeking help nor the person trying to render assistance was understanding the other’s inability to comprehend what was being said or asked.  Believe me when I say that that is a situation that can turn volatile in a nano-second.  Especially in the level sensor business, there are some fairly creative ways for end users to improperly install point level sensors in a way that will severely impact the sensors ability to function as it was designed to do. Maybe we will work on a top ten list for later publication. Anyway, what I am doing on a more frequent basis is to ask the customer if they have a digital camera at their disposal. About now you are saying to yourself, “Self, almost everyone with a cell phone has a digital camera these days.”  While this may be true, my experience with the quality of the pictures taken and sent by a cell phone is that the pictures received are very often all but useless due to low resolution of the image.  Some of the newer cell phones have better resolution but there are going to be a large quantity of poor resolution camera phones out there for some time to come.  Almost any off the shelf digital camera is capable of providing the resolution needed to see intricate construction detail of some sensor mounting that was previously verbally obscure in the description of someone speaking a different mechanical language than the other person. When trying to photograph a sensor or sensor mount inside a dark silo, the low lux (low light) capabilities of most digital cameras indeed becomes a huge asset.

Innocent misunderstandings can change the tone of a conversation from friendly to confrontational in a very short time. No one wants that to happen and it can cause bridges to burn so to speak. So, if you find yourself in a situation when either receiving technical help or giving it and someone is not getting (ready for this?) “The Big Picture” (sorry, I couldn't resist J ), consider asking for or volunteer to take a digital picture and email it to the other party. A digital camera is a valuable tool and it can potentially reduce the amount of time it takes for a tech support person to identify a problem and offer a solution.  Best of all, a reasonably capable digital camera that is small enough to fit in a pocket can be quite inexpensive making it quite easy to justify obtaining one.

Take a look at the photo at the top of this blog post.  This photo happened to be taken by one of our service techs but it shows a bad installation for this guided wave radar sensor and explains why it wasn't working properly.  Never extend a nozzle into the silo when installing a guided wave radar level sensor.  The customer could have been talking to us for a long time before he stumbled on this little known fact because the installer and the person we speak with to provide tech support many times aren't the same people.  A picture is indeed priceless and worth more than a thousand words.

Greg DeRudder

Technorati Tags: level sensor level measurement bin level indicator level control solids level indicator guided wave radar 

Ethanol production is good for level measurement and good for the world.....

Ethanol production require a vast amount and variety of process measurement instrumentation as part of the overll automation and control of the plant processes.  For level measurement there are applications throughout the process from monitoring inventories of raw corn to helping to control dryers, to the monitoring of storage vessels containing the finished product.  But recently we have begun to hear in the media a number of comments talking about how bad Ethanol production is and has been.  It has increased the demand for corn and driven food prices up.  Well perhaps in the short term that is true but living out here in the corn belt of Illinois I can tell you that this country has more corn than you can imagine.  And, corn is not the only raw ingredient that Ethanol can be produced from, it is just the most common right now.

The point I want to make is in regards to the impact Ethanol production has on the world supply and cost of fuel.  I point to a study and report recently issued by LECG.  First, LECG (I have no idea what LECG stands for) is a "global expert services" firm.  They do studies and render expert opinions on a number of subjects.  Well, the Renewable Fuels Association had them do an impact study of Ethanol on the cost of crude oil.  That's right.  They answered the question "what would the impact be on crude oil prices today if Ethanol production did not exist?".  Well before I tell you what they found out let me tell you that they reported that the amount of Ethanol produced in the world in 2007 was 17 billion gallons.  The majority of this was produced in the USA and Brazil.  In 2008 it is projected that this production will increase by 20% to 20.4 billion gallons.

There appear to be complexities in calculating the impact of Ethanol on crude oil prices and I don't have the time, nor the patience, to dig into it and report it here for you, but the report by the LECG indicates that crude oil would cost another $35.70 per barrel if it weren't for the production of Ethanol.  Think about the effect of that on the price per gallon of gasoline next time you fill up and next time you drive by a corn field, or next time you hear someone talk down the Ethanol industry.

A complete editorial about the LECG report can be found written by editor Myke Feinman of Bieofuels Journal magazine.  The editorial appears on page 110 of the May/June 2008 issue.

Want to know more about the level measurement and monitoring applications in an Ethanol production operation?  Download this file.  It's a white paper on that subject. Download WhitePaper_EthanolSolutions.pdf   

Joe Lewis

Technorati Tags: Ethanol level sensor level measurement bin level indicator level control solids level indicator guided wave radar

Trade shows still work ......

Recently I had the opportunity and good fortune to be part of our exhibition at GEAPS.  This is the Grain Elevator And Processing Society.  We exhibited with a 10' x 10' space.  The GEAPS annual meeting is a great function.  Unlike other "trade shows" the GEAPS annual meeting is just that, a meeting.  The exposition part of it is just one part, and it really is great.  More valuable than leads from this exposition is the networking time spent with customers and potential customers, representatives, manufacturers and everyone that's anyone involved in these industries.  It reminded what it is like to be a part of a community and its a great one.

I just wanted to take minute here at the Level Measurement blog to thank everyone that administrates GEAPS and to thank all the members that attended this years meeting and exposition.  Thank you!  I look forward to seeing everyone at the 2009 meeting being held in St. Louis.

Thanks GEAPS!

Joe Lewis

Technorati Tags: GEAPS Powder Bulk Solids Show trade showslevel sensor level measurement

Election connection ..........

I am sure that many of you have grown weary of the election already, this one seems like it has been going on forever. 

The 24-hour media outlets do a good job of saturating us with constant updates concerning the front-runners and don't forget the latest celebrity endorsements.  Thanks to Oprah and Chuck Norris ...... if I cannot make up my own mind, a celebrity will be happy to do it for me. The worst is yet to come as we get closer to November!  For some help in seeing differences between the candidates, click here.

But this isn't really anything new.  The reason I wanted to post about the election is because of the effect that such things have on our economy.  A recent report from a market study company indicates that business investment plans dropped by 40% in January from December.  Many are brewing up a recession in their minds and all the talk doesn't help.  However, recently I have seen articles in trade publications like Concrete Producer February issue indicate and prognosticate that the recession fears are not going to come to fruiting. 
My question to you here is do you think that business will be influenced by the fact that this is an election year?  Are you expecting things in your business to pick up or slow down?

Please let me know your thoughts,

Scott Bonine
National Sales Manager
Monitor Technologies

Here we go again ...... wired or wireless, they seem to act the same

It seems like "dejavu".  In the last couple of decades of the 20th century the big giant process instrumentation companies did battle to see who was going to be able to drive the standards for communication protocols.  The big battles were between HART and Foundation Fieldbus that emanated out of the ISA SP50 committee.  If memory serves me, HART had become a defacto standard long before the SP50 was finished with their work and the first commercial products were available.  The fight between Emerson/Rosemount and Foxboro, Honeywell and others was a classic.... and the user was not served very well if you ask me.  There are still three primary field instrument communication standards, e.g. HART, Foundation Fieldbus and Profibus.   A recent research study reported that the first Fieldbus device was installed in 1997 and there are now almost 1.4 million Fieldbus devices installed around the world.  However, this pales by comparison to HART.  If you don't know how HART works, click here.

In his blog post from March 2007 Walt Boyes (editor of CONTROL magazine) estimated there were roughly 22 million HART devices installed.  He also puts the Fieldbus device total closer to 500 or600 thousand.  No matter, 22 million HART devices simply dominates the installed base of digitally connected devices.  Another third party study indicates that HART represents 71% of process instruments purchased each year in North America with digital connectivity.  It appears obvious that HART had become, and still is today, the defacto standard in wired digital protocols.  That's important to understand because for small process instrument companies with limited resources we can focus in on the development and marketing of a single digital protocol and provide a marketable device that will meet the needs of a vast majority of the market.  No matter how hard the HART opponents fought or how much money went into opposing HART, it is still the market leader.  It may be decades before it is replaced as the leader.  NO, I am not going to get into the argument of HART's disadvantages or advantages.  YES, I know it is not technically a "fieldbus", but I am not claiming it to be..... it provides digital connectivity for process instruments.

So, what's happening with wireless?  The same thing?  Maybe.  HART recently (September 7, 2007) formally announced the WirelessHART standard.  The attacks began before the formal release and intensified in trade publications.  However, check out the information about what WirelessHART can do at this web link.

The typical attacks against WirelessHART can be summed in the editorial written by Tim Bourke of Honeywell and published in the October/November issue of PETRO Industry News on pages 18 and 19.  The summary of conclusions is that 1) not all bus standards will run on WirelessHART and 2) there is no case where WirelessHART will work that the ISA100 standard will not.  Not a very convincing argument today for the small size process instrument company that can afford only a single implementation to drive and meet user demand. 

However, there is a possible difference between how the wired standards were developed and handled and how the wireless standards seem to be emerging.  At the recent ISA show last month it was decided, by HART foundation members and members of the ISA100 committee, that the ISA standard approach would work to integrate WirelessHART in its first release through a dual gateway architecture and then a more integrated approach in release 2.  Maybe the pundits on both sides will behave differently this time.  If so, the user will have a much better offering to look forward to.  Time will tell.  If not, we will likely see WirelessHART dominate the market of installed wireless connected instruments just as it does today for the wired digital connectivity.

Joe Lewis

Technorati Tags: wireless wireless HART wireless fieldbus ISA SP100

You Disappoint me....

No one likes to hear these three words, although there are several three-word combinations more disturbing, some examples are:

You are fired.
The IRS called.
Honey, I'm late.

But seriously, disappointing someone or being disappointed, is something we in sales deal with daily. Sometimes we are disappointed because we did not get the PO, or disappointed we could not see the "hallowed decision maker". 

In sales sometimes we are disappointing a customer because we cannot solve a problem for them, technical limitations, price, delivery, et- cetera, all may not fit into the customers plan or meet their level of expectation.

The key, in my opinion, to help minimize disappointment, is to properly manage levels of expectation.  I think this reigns supreme regardless of where we are at in the process.  If we as sales people can properly manage the customers level of expectation regarding product ability, lead times, or any of the other random hundred things out to get us we can hopefully avoid "disappointing" our customers.

With level controls, especially with inventory management systems, managing the customers level of expectation is huge!  Any device that measures "distance" and relies on a "calculation" to "convert" a "distance" reading into some other type of information must be properly managed early in the sales process.

How many times have we all provided a perfectly fine system for inventory management to a customer only to get a telephone call from someone in "purchasing" wondering why they are "off" by a few hundred pounds. 

Nothing fills a salesperson's bowels with ice water faster than a call like this! Now you find yourself re-explaining a technology and how a system operates, you are quickly knee-deep in doing damage control.  We all know that the salesperson's favorite non-profit hobby is doing damage control!

How much of this could have been avoided if only the customers level of expectation was better managed? I think we all would agree, that when a customer knows exactly what to expect calls are minimized.

My suggestion is to let us help you, we can work with you to hopefully manage the customers level of expectation and avoid disappointing someone.

Thanks,

Scott Bonine
National Sales Manager

Technorati Tags: sales management customer relations inventory monitoring

Back to the future of level measurement sensor placement

Hello, McFly! Is anybody in there?

Why is sensor selection usually the very last thing that gets considered when new silos are ordered. Having said that, many times level sensors are not even thought of until the silo has been erected on site. Then there is the "we will have to modify the silo to accommodate level sensors crisis".  Perhaps the silos were already cleaned and there is some material already being stored so cutting and welding is out of the question. Etc., etc., etc.

Too late for load cells and you didn't like the price tag anyway. So, I guess we will have to settle on a sensor that measures the empty air space and then calculates the volume and weight and make compromises to fabricate a process connection. Too often these days, I am seeing more and more new silo installations with fill points that are not in the center of the vessel. Every level measurement technology out there, except gravimetric, measures the distance (air space)between the sensor and a point of intersection on the material being measured. If the vessel is truly centerfilled and the level sensor is mounted at 1/6th the diameter from the outer wall on the radius, the calculated volume and or weight of the material will be very close to actual assuming all dimensional data and the bulk density data are accurate. Follow this link and download item 3 for complete details regarding sensor placement and accuracy of calculated volumes and weights: http://www.monitortech.com/wseminars.shtml  One word of caution is that some silo manufacturers consider center filled to be a fill point that is located anywhere within a circle defined as less than one-third of the radius. This is not good enough if you are striving to maximize the calculated accuracy.

Finally,remember to add an independent self-validating point level sensor to alert you when your silo is full and to prevent over-filling and potential spills, even those due to unknown sensor failure.  Refer to other posts within this blog.

Greg DeRudder

Technorati Tags: level sensor level measurement bin level indicator level control solids level indicator

Trade Shows-Are they still valid?

Greetings,

A few weeks ago I was tasked with "manning" the Monitor Technologies booth at a trade show.

Over the years I have participated in many trade shows, stranded on a 10X10 square of cheap carpet hoping to share a smile with a "qualified" customer dying to place an order with me.  This particular show was no exception.

As I looked down the aisle targeting my next victim, I asked myself if the entire concept of the "trade show" was still relevent.  After all, we have the Internet available, any and all information known to man (and beast) is ready to view with the click of a "mouse" from the comfort of your own cubicle (or couch if you work from home).

With the Internet available, why would anyone still want to travel to a convention center, pay an outrageous amount for parking, spend $13.00 for a hot dog and a bottle of tepid water(in a bottle that may have already been used!) and spend the day being hounded by overly eager salespeople out to up their "lead count" for the President sitting back at the office?

I can only provide an answer from my perspective, a desperate sales manager trying to hit "goal" so I can avoid having my employer ask for their "logo" shirts back!

I see each conversation as a sales call.  I look at the number of "booth chats" and ask how long it would have taken and at what cost would have been involved for me to travel to see all of these people.  Usually, the trade show was cheaper than what the travel would have been.

I also find value in the "networking" that occurs at trade shows, (I hate the word "networking", it reeks of marketing mumbo-jumbo) but there is real value to seeing people face to face, building relationships. 

I also think that trade shows are a necessary evil, we need to be there just because our competition is there!  Imagine what would happen if "they" were there and we were not!  What would that say about our company, what would that say to our customers?

Enough about my senseless ramblings, what are your thoughts? Do you see trade shows as something of value for your company?  Why?

Please let me know, maybe I will reward you with a handful of orange or white golf tees the next time I see you!

Scott Bonine

Regional Sales Manager

What's useful to you?

So what industry websites and tools do you use?  I'd really like to know how useful our visitors feel that industry sites like Powder and Bulk Dot Com are to them.  There appears to be some great content at this website.  I personally think the discussion forums, the News Center summaries and the Case Histories are valuable.  But to be useful the user and readers need to be in charge.  While I have nothing to do with the creation or content on the particular site mentioned previously, I am interested in what you think.  And, if you are really in the powder and bulk solids processing industry or in the need for instruments or PBS equipment and take the time to comment on this blog post I will make sure we send you a "thank you" gift in return (we can get your mailing data by email after you post a comment).  The gift will include one of the popular industry white papers on continuous level measurement along with a marketing premium (small token or gift) from Monitor Technologies for you to use.  All comments are screened.

In addition to the website mentioned above, do you actively review magazine websites and their forums and product news information?  Take a look at some of the better ones in our industry, such as Processing magazine, Chemical Engineering magazine, Powder Bulk Solids magazine, Powder Bulk Engineering magazine and Canadian Process and Equipment Control News.  Are any of these sites useful to you?  IF yes, why?  If no, why not?  What can these sites and this blog do to be of service to you?

Let's start a conversation!

Joe Lewis

Technorati Tags: level sensor level measurement bin level indicator level control solids level indicator