We have been titled as 'Jack of all trades'. I think it is likely that we're 'master of all'. Frankly, its nothing to brag about.
This is the 'occupational hazard' of being an instrumentation engineer. If you work in an engineering company, or are familiar with the working of one, you are no alien to the fact that instrumentation makes up only 10-15 % of the total manhour calculations and also around the same percentage of of the entire budget of the project is dedicated to instrumentation. It is thus, very clear, on paper that we have got less than an ounce of work on the project, when you compare us with biggies like 'Civil' 'Mechanical and 'Piping' (technical departments). In between the huge fabricated vessels, large mechanical rotary equipment like compressors, the intense network of pipe racks throughout the plant, all built on their equally strong and large civil foundations of RCC, it is certainly hard to notice that the huge fabricated vessels have some small tappings, with level sensors, which protect the vessel from overflowing and 'drowning' the plant (its an exaggeration, but its probably the mildest thing that could happen if level controls are not in place !! ). No one would give a damn about those little pressure transmitters at the suction and discharge of compressors...indeed they arent noticeable and I cannot explain how important they are !! Those piperacks, that also accommodate instrument cable ducts and trays. (I cant tell you the purpose of running cables throughout the plant...you must know that yourself instrument engineer or not...if you dont or cant figure that out, you're foolish !!).
The valves, transducers, control systems, the cables, the UPS requirements for all these, the compressor controls, the impulse piping / tubing hookups, Input / Output generation....you name it and we do it...
I thank god, that process engineers do not shirk their responsibility of developing P&IDs. Otherwise we would have to do that too...as P&IDs are 'Piping and Instrumentation Diagrams' !!
Moreover, if the above mentioned equipments do not work, it is most likely that an instrument engineer is called upon first citing suspicions on the malfunction of an instrument in the line rather than the equipment or piping !! I cant remember any examples or I would've written it here. Our problem is that, we do not design equipment that is large in size. But the quantity of the smaller items that make up instrumentation of a plant is larger in number !! For each piece of equipment there might be a 100 instruments !! For 100 equipments the number is quite quite large, if you do the math! Still these small items are lower in cost, but require a lot of design engineering.
In short, they are just like us instrumentation engineers. There are lots of them out in this world who work hard for lesser money than their so called big brothers ...Civil, Piping and mechanical !!
I conclude my small 'essay' with an analogy....
The control system is a system which controls the plant process. Which means that it will alert personnel in case of a hazard, and also trip / shutdown a plant when necessary...and those are just two of the many things it does !!
A control system is like forces of nature which control the earth and its beings.
The 'Forces of nature' were created by God. A very realistic question....Is God an Instrumentation Engineer?? :)
