MONITORING THE STATE OF A PIEZOELECTRIC TRANSDUCER Russian patent published in 2023 - IPC G01F1/325 G01F25/10 G01P21/02 G05B23/02 

FIELD: industrial process control; monitoring systems.

SUBSTANCE: industrial process field devices for determining the flow rate of an industrial process medium used in industrial process control and monitoring systems. Industrial process field device includes a piezoelectric transducer, a sensor circuit, a test circuit, a controller, and a communication circuit. The sensor circuit generates a sensor signal indicating a process variable based on the voltage across the piezoelectric transducer. The test circuit is configured to apply a voltage pulse having a pulsed voltage to the piezoelectric transducer, which induces a response signal, and capture positive and negative voltages of the response signal. The controller calculates the current state value of the piezoelectric transducer based on the peak positive voltage, the peak negative voltage, and the impulse voltage, and generates a diagnostic test result based on the comparison of the current state value with a reference state value corresponding to a properly operating piezoelectric transducer. The communication circuit transmits the process variable and the diagnostic test result to an external control unit in the process control loop.

EFFECT: detection of a faulty piezoelectric transducer of the device directly during operation of the device without taking the field device out of service and transporting it to testing equipment.

20 cl, 3 dwg