30.3.

QUANTITATIVE PID TUNING PROCEDURES

30.3

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Quantitative PID tuning procedures

A quantitative PID tuning procedure is a step-by-step approach leading directly to a set of numerical
values to be used in a PID controller. These procedures may be split into two categories: open loop
and closed loop. An open loop tuning procedure is implemented with the controller in manual
mode: introducing a step-change to the controller output and then mathematically analyzing the
results of the process variable response to calculate appropriate PID settings for the controller to
use when placed into automatic mode. A closed loop tuning procedure is implemented with the
controller in automatic mode: adjusting tuning parameters to achieve an easily-defined result, then
using those PID parameter values and information from a graph of the process variable over time
to calculate new PID parameters.
Quantitative PID tuning got its start with a paper published in the November 1942 Transactions
of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers written by two engineers named Ziegler and
Nichols. Optimum Settings For Automatic Controllers is a seminal paper, and deserves to be read
by every serious student of process control theory. That Zieglers and Nichols recommendations for
PID controller settings may still be found in modern references more than 60 years after publication
is a testament to its impact in the field of industrial control. Although dated in its terminology
and references to pneumatic controller technology (some controllers mentioned as not even having
adjustable proportional response, and others as having only discrete degrees of reset adjustment
rather than continuously variable settings!), the PID algorithm described by its authors and the
effects of P, I, and D adjustments on process control behavior are as valid today as they were then.
This section is devoted to a discussion of quantitative PID tuning procedures in general, and
the Ziegler-Nichols methods in specific. It is the opinion of this author that the Ziegler-Nichols
tuning methods are useful primarily as historical references, and indeed suffer from serious practical
impediments. The most serious reservation I have with the Ziegler-Nichols methods (and in fact
any algorithmic procedure for PID tuning) is that these methods tend to absolve the practitioner
of responsibility for understanding the process they intend to tune. Any time you provide people
with step-by-step instructions to perform complex tasks, there will be a great many readers of those
instructions tempted to mindlessly follow the instructions, even to their doom. PID tuning is one of
these complex tasks, and there is significant likelihood for a person to do more harm than good if
all they do is implement a step-by-step approach rather than understand what they are doing, why
they are doing it, and what it means if the results do not meet with satisfaction. Please bear this
in mind as you study any PID tuning procedure, Ziegler-Nichols or otherwise.