Modelling & Identification for Thermal Control of Cooling Water with Varying Flow

Thermal effects can have a significant impact in precision engineering applications. To reduce this impact, thermal conditioning of the system via circulating water can be applied. The accuracy with which a system can be conditioned depends on the temperature variations of the water. A heater system with temperature sensors has been designed to enable active control of the water temperature. This system has shown to achieve millikelvin accuracy. With the aim of achieving this accuracy over multiple flow rates, modelling and identification techniques are explored and applied. This work forms a basis on which controllers can be designed that can attenuate temperature disturbances over a wide operating range.