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Interpreting Piping and Instrumentation

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  in the series How to Interpret Piping and Instrumentation Diagrams

With a Bit of Smoke, a Few Mirrors and a Degree in Hieroglyphics, Anyone Can Learn to Read a

P&ID. This is Part 1 of a five-part series.

Part 1 - Introduction

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engineer. I guess that's earned me my vice, VP of Engineering and Technology

Development to be precise. Hi there. I'm Bob Cook and I'm glad to have you along for my

premier entry here on ChEnected.com where we explore the interpretation of Piping and

Instrumentation Diagrams, or P&IDs for those in the know. This is a topic that can

benefit process, project and design engineers, business developers, operators, safety,

maintenance and even management. Wow, that a lot of folks! However, consider this - allof the members listed above will either come across P&IDs intermittently or have to work

with them as a core aspect of their job. And if I still have your attention then, yes, you too

should have a solid understanding of how to read them! Hey you hiding the back...don't be

bashful. You say that you are two, three...five years out of school and still not sure

you really have a good handle on P&IDs? You're not alone.  Having worked for many

companies and provided services to a variety of industries over the years, I find it curious

how P&IDs are often poorly understood by those who should know them better. In some

cases, they exude this aura of intimidating, complex documents that only ChE geeks (and

the like) really know how to read. I believe this is simply due to a dearth of formal training.Folks are just expected to pick it up "on the fly". Given the variability in career direction

our backgrounds in the best engineering field afford us, this works well for some but

leaves others playing catch-up later on. So even experienced engineers and operators may

one day discover their lack of knowledge on the topic puts them at a disadvantage. So let's

 just put a stop to all that by taking P&IDs apart in this multi-part series.

Regardless of experience level, you will find many of the symbols are obvious. Others need

a bit more explanation. In much the same way ancient Egyptians used hieroglyphics

thousands of years ago, we process folks (in conjunction with our peers in the electrical,

controls and other departments) just come up with our own set of symbols to represent the

various equipment, devices and control concepts that go into our plants. When you look at

it that way, one could argue that not much has changed in a few thousand years. I supposethat's true. Hey, if it isn't broke, why fix it? Enough of my bantering, let's get started already.

 

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I look forward to a healthy exchange. Part 2 will dig into P&IDs - The Fundamentals. I'll

include a few example drawings that we can use as we venture forth down that path of 

process knowledge. If you want to get a head start, download them here. Stay tuned!

Comments or Questions? Just make/ask them in the comments field.

Answers will probably come in a future post in the series but I'd love to see yourquestions or observations.

Abbas (not verified)

 A U G 2 4 , 2 0 1 0   

Very eye catching language so far apart from technical

matters.:) I have a question as I m a debutant in this field.

Why do we need P&ID's in the first place when we have

PFD's and mechanical drawings etc.? Thank u

RGCook (not verified) 

 A U G 2 5 , 2 0 1 0   

Abbas - the comment system is giving me fits. For now, I

will simply say that this is a topic of Part 2 in the series

(although I drafted up a thorough response to your

question). I just can't get it to post, maybe owing to text

limitations.

Naji (not verified)

O C T 3 , 2 0 1 0      

PFD tells what the process does P&ID shows how the

process can be operated Mechanical drawing for how to

build it

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