Brush Up on Your Technical Terminology for Industrial and Lab Equipment

Not sure what cavitation and viscosity have to do with your lab equipment? Time for a refresher on your terminology? Look below for an abbreviated list of common terms used for electrical, pressure, electrochemistry, and lab instruments and processes.

Absolute pressure (psia): The total force per unit area exerted by a fluid. It is the sum of atmospheric and gauge pressures.

Buffer: In chemistry terms, a solution that maintains a set pH value regardless of added acids or bases; often used for calibration.

Cavitation: Process in which small bubbles are formed and implode violently. This results in aggressive cleaning action in ultrasonic cleaners.

Convection: Transmission of energy or mass in a medium by movement of the medium itself.

Density: The mass of a given substance per unit volume, often expressed as pounds/ft³ or grams/cm³.

Direct current (DC): A current with a constant polarity.

Explosion-proof (XPRF) motor: A totally enclosed motor that will withstand an explosion of a specific vapor or gas within its housing, or will prevent sparks or flashes generated within its housing from igniting surrounding vapor or gas.

Gauge pressure (psig): A measure of the force per area exerted by a fluid using atmospheric pressure as a zero reference.

Impedance: The opposition in an electric circuit to the flow of an alternating current. It consists of ohmic resistance, inductive reactance, and capacitive reactance.

LIMS (Laboratory Information Management System): A system that manages operations of a testing laboratory

Open drip-proof (ODP) motor: An open motor with ventilator openings that will prevent liquids and solids, dropped from an angle of 0° to 15° from vertical, from interfering with its operation.

Proportional control: Control in which the amount of corrective action is proportional to the amount of error.

Range: The limits within which a device or circuit operates or the distance over which a transmitter operates reliably.

Serial transmission: Sending one bit at a time on a single transmission line.

Temperature compensation: Correction for the influence of temperature on a measurement.

Transducer: Any device which generates an electrical signal from real world physical measurements.

Transmitter: A device which translates the low-level output of a sensor or transducer to a higher level signal suitable for transmission to a site where it can be further processed.

Three-phase motor: A relatively inexpensive, self-starting motor (no starting winding or capacitor); can start heavy loads. The motor requires a three-phase AC power supply.

Viscosity: The resistance of a fluid to flow when subjected to shear stress.