• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2000.04b
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• pp.154-161
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• 2000

As a mass flow controller is widely used in many manufacturing processes for controlling a mass flow rate of gas with accuracy of 1%, several investigators have tried to describe the heat transfer phenomena in a sensor tube of an MFC. They suggested a few analytic solutions and numerical models based on simple assumptions, which are physically unrealistic. In the present work, the heat transfer phenomena in the sensor tube of the MFC are studied by using both experimental and numerical methods. The numerical model is introduced to estimate the temperature profile in the sensor tube as well as in the gas stream. In the numerical model, the conjugate heat transfer problem comprising the tube wall and the gas stream is analyzed to fully understand the heat transfer interaction between the sensor tube and the fluid stream using a single domain approach. This numerical model is further verified by experimental investigation. In order to describe the transport of heat energy in both the flow region and the sensor tube, the Nusselt number at the interface between the tube wall and the gas stream as well as heatlines is presented from the numerical solution.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2001.06e
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• pp.595-600
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• 2001

Thermal mass flow meter(TMF) and thermal mass flow controller(MFC) were used to measure and to control the mass flow rate of gases. TMF and MFC were designed for specified working pressure and gas. For the case of different working pressure and gases, the flow rate measurement accuracy decreased dramatically. In this study, a TMF and MFC was tested with three different gases and pressure range from 0.2 MPa up to 1.0 MPa. Effect of specific heat causes to increase flow measurement error as much as ratio of specific heat compared with reference gas. Changing of pressure causes to increase flow rate measurement error about -0.2% as the working pressure decreased 0.1 MPa. Response time of MFC was below 3.12 s for the case of increasing of flow rate. But the response time was increased up to 6.92 s for the case of decreasing of flow rate. When the solenoid valve was fully closed, a initial delay time of output of MFC was increased up to 1.36 s.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Manufacturing Process Engineers
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• v.3 no.1
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• pp.79-83
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• 2004

This study was how to control the mass flow controller in gas supplying system. The flow controller consists of piezoelectric material and sensor with heating wire. It is difficult to obtain accurate model, because MFC was composed of many parts, and the relationship between input and output of controller is nonlinear. The model for control was obtained by time constant and DC gain Based on this model, PID controller was applied to flow controller using DSP board. Also, the results were compared to controller using system identification.

• Journal of Mechanical Science and Technology
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.40-47
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• 2003

In this paper, we constructed the analytic model of control valve as a function of electric and geometric parameters, and analyzed the influence of the design parameters on the dynamic characteristics. For improving the dynamic characteristics, optimal design is conducted by applying sequential quadratic programming method to the analytic model. This optimal design aims to minimize the response time and maximize force efficiency. By this procedure, control valve can be designed to have fast response in motion.

• 제어로봇시스템학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2003.10a
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• pp.1295-1299
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• 2003

The Mass Flow Controller(MFC) has become crucial in semiconductor manufacturing equipments. It is an important element because the quality and the yield of a semiconductor process are decided by the accurate flow control of gas. Therefore, the demand for the high speed and the highly accurate control of MFCs has been requested. It is hard to find an article of the control algorithm applied to MFCs. But, it is known that commercially available MFCs have PID control algorithms. Particularly, when the system detects the flow by way of heat transfer, MFC control problem contains the time delay and the nonlinearity. In this presentation, MFC control algorithm with the superior performance to the conventional PID algorithm is discussed and the superiority is demonstrated through the experiment. Fuzzy controller was utilized in order to compensate the nonlinearity and the time delay, and the performance is compared with that of a product currently available in the market. The control system, in this presentation, consists of a personal computer, the data acquisition board and the control algorithm carried out by LabWindows/CVI program on the PC. In addition, the method of estimating an actual flow from sensor output containing the time delay and the nonlinearity is presented. In conclusion, according to the result of the experiment, the proposed algorithm shows better accuracy and is faster than the conventional controller.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2000.02a
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• pp.35-35
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• 2000

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers B
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• v.33 no.8
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• pp.573-579
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• 2009

A thermal mass air flow sensor, which consists of a micro-heater and thermal sensors on the silicon-nitride thin membrane structure, is micro-fabricated by MEMS processes. Three thermo-resistive sensors, one for the measurement of microheater temperature, the others for the measurement of membrane temperature upstream and downstream of the micro-heater respectively, are used. The micro-heater is operated under the constant temperature difference mode via a real time controller, based on inlet air temperature. Two design models for microfabricated flow sensor are compared with experimental results and confirmed their applicabilities and limitations. The thermal characteristics are measured to find the best flow indicator. It is found that two normalized temperature indicators can be adopted with some advantages in practice. The flow sensor with this control mode can be adopted for wide capability of high speed and sensitivity in the very low and medium velocity ranges.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2013.05a
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• pp.893-894
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• 2013

• Journal of Institute of Control, Robotics and Systems
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.19-25
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• 2007

The MFC(Mass Flow Controller) is an equipment that measures and controls mass flow rates of fluid. Most of the HFC system is still using the PID algorithm. The PID algorithm shows superior performance on the MFC system. But the PID algorithm in the MFC system has a few problems as followed. The characteristic of the MFC system is changed according to the operating environment. And, when the piezo valve that uses the control valve is assembled in the MFC system, a coupling error is generated. Therefore, it is very difficult to find out the exact parameters of MFC system. In this paper, we propose adaptive PID algorithm in order to compensate these problems of a traditional PID algorithm. The adaptive PID algorithm estimates the parameters of MFC system using LMS(Least Mean Square) algorithm and calculates the coefficients of PID controller. Besides, adaptive PID algorithm shows better transient response because adaptive PID algorithm includes a feedforward. And we implement MFC system using proposed adaptive PID algorithm with self-tuning and Ziegler and Nickels's method. Finally, comparative analysis of the proposed adaptive PID and the traditional PID is shown.

• Proceedings of the Korea Technology Innovation Society Conference
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• 2001.05a
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• pp.411-430
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• 2001

This Paper analyses characteristics of the numerical controller industry in market formation and the flow of information between users and producers and the characteristic of knowledge base of the industry and discusses the difficulties derived, from the characteristics, in accumulation of technological capability In market formation between users and producers, the multi-layered market is not favorable to domestic producers in that lower end market is not large enough to provide cradle market to them which produce inferior quality and lower price than imported products. The credibility of the performance of a product is difficult to prove until a critical mass of products are sold. Therefore gaining market share is deterred by unproven credibility of the performance of the product. The flow of information between users and producers is limited. The flow of information on users environment through mass market to producers is essential for improving credibility of a product. The nature of knowledge base is tacit and the means of knowledge transmission is limited. Technological licensing and reverse engineering, which have been conventional means of knowledge transmission, are not useful in the numerical controller industry. These characteristics provide conditions of vicious circle in accumulation of technological capability of the numerical controller industry. It is conjectured that these characteristics are derived from the fact that the numerical controller is the result of IT based technological convergence in controlling machining process. This paper argues that these characteristics of the industry challenges existing approach to R&D management and framework of science and technology Policy.