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Flow
Research is pleased to announce that The World Market for Mass
Flow Controllers, 3rd Edition began rolling out in July and is
selling fast.
The mass flow controller
(MFC) market is highly competitive, with a large
number of suppliers. In fact,
it is
one of the most rapidly developing
markets in the flowmeter world today. If
you want to know exactly where the mass flow controller market is going and just how
quickly it is growing, you'll want to this study today.
Among
other trends, the study found that the MFC market is growing the fastest in China, Western Europe, and North
America, in that order. Economies in China, India, and other emerging markets in Asia and elsewhere
are driving the MFC market upward. These economies are growing at a rapid pace and have an
expanding middle class.
New
markets
A major portion of
mass flow controllers are used in the semiconductor industry for measuring
gas flow, and that market is large.
However, the semiconductor market is unpredictable and cyclical, and more
and more MFC manufacturers are actively attempting to broaden their base in other industrial and laboratory/research market spaces. Some of these segments are growing faster than semiconductor manufacturing, and hold the promise of long-term MFC applications.
New environmental applications such as fuel cells and solar/photovoltaic have opened up
avenues for MFCs. In addition, new manufacturing processes and the push for automation in factories are driving MFC market growth.
In the world of internet of things (IoT) and Industry 4.0, unique identifiers permit networked devices to collect and share data with common control points as well as with each other, and this capability is changing the way industrial processes work. Increasingly, devices share performance data that then changes their own operating status. The result is improved process flows, reduced employee monitoring, faster response times to changing process conditions, enhanced safety, and overall increases in both production quality and volume. MFCs can provide accurate data points and control in a way that some legacy flow measurement devices cannot.
Check
out these many industrial and
lab/research applications for mass flow controllers.
| Industrial Segment
|
Applications |
| Aerospace |
Hydraulic systems test and fabrication;
ventilation R&D; hardening canopies for jet aircraft |
| Analytical/gas analyzers |
Analytical sampling;
gas sample preparation and measurement; verifying flow and pressure for multiple gases flowing to and from gas chromatographs |
| Automotive emissions
testing |
Emissions monitoring;
measuring compressed air; verification of SHED (Sealed Housing for Evaporative Determination) operations;
exhaust gases |
| Biotech/pharmaceutical |
Process control of reactor gases to fermentation;
bioreactor gas management; maintain quality in drug manufacturing, production,
FDA testing, and culture growing |
| Chemical/petrochemical |
Measurement of gases in chemical processes and manufacturing |
| Electronics manufacturing |
Manufacture of computers, monitors, and other electronic equipment;
laser welding and cutting |
| Fiber optics/glass
manufacturing |
Glass manufacturing;
ultraviolet coating on glass; fiber optics and glass coating;
bulletproof glass for cars; high purity optics for bathroom faucet coatings |
| Food and beverage |
Blending;
process control in bottling, drying, mixing, cooling; protective gases for packaging;
wine and beer making |
| Fuel cells |
Measuring efficiency of fuel cells |
| Furnaces |
Flame control;
gas mixing and blending; burner control |
| Gas distribution |
Gas consumption measurement for internal accounting purposes |
| Heat treating |
Burner control;
welding |
| LED lighting |
Particulate dispersal, gas used in deposition, OLED |
| Medical |
Check performance of equipment;
anesthesia; medical equipment manufacturing |
| Metals processing |
Improve quality of manufactured metals |
| Packaging |
Protective gases for packages |
| Solar/Photovoltaic |
Application of thin film coatings
to panels |
| Power |
Measurement of gases used in power generation |
How
they work
Mass flow controllers contain an integrated control valve that is
used to control the flow as well as measure it.
Although more
MFC suppliers are introducing differential pressure (DP), ultrasonic, and Coriolis technology,
thermal technology continues to dominate.
The
roots of thermal flowmeters go back to the hot wire anemometers that were
used for airflow measurement in the early 1900s, although thermal
flowmeters were not introduced for industrial applications until the 1970s.
Thermal
flowmeters use heat in making their flow measurements.
Thermal flowmeters put heat into the flowstream and use one or more
temperature sensors to measure how quickly this heat dissipates.
Heat dissipation is measured in two main ways:
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One
method of measuring heat dissipation keeps a heated sensor at a constant
temperature and measures how much current is needed to keep it at that
temperature.
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Another method
measures the temperature difference between the flowstream temperature and
a heated sensor.
What is
common to both methods is the idea that higher speed flow results in
increased cooling. Both measure the effects of this increased cooling, and compute mass
flow based on this result.
Coriolis-based
MFCs, however, offer better accuracy and operate independent of fluid properties, and their sensor is by nature faster than a sensor based on heat transfer. Ultrasonic technology MFCs also offer faster response time to changes in flowrate than their thermal versions
In
addition to The World Market for Mass Flow Controllers, 3rd Edition,
we have a separate study on thermal flowmeters, The World Market for Thermal
Flowmeters, 2nd Edition.
Articles
About Mass Flow Controllers
Previous Mass
Flow Controller Studies
The
World Market Update for Mass Flow Controllers
Published
July 2015
The World Market for
Mass Flow Controllers, 2nd Edition
Published
July 2012
The
World Market for Mass Flow Controllers -
Published
July 2008
Articles
About Mass Flow Controllers
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