exida

exida explains Blog

Entries tagged with: Safety Instrumented Function

Back to Basics 05 – What is a Safety Function?

Back to Basics 05 – What is a Safety Function?

A Safety Function is the action of a collection of equipment to implement automatic mitigation of a particular hazard. It is the job of the Safety Instrumented Function (SIF).

Some examples of common Safety Functions: 

  • Car brake stop
  • ESD valve – Shutdown process
  • Sprinkler system 
  • High…

    Read More...

How to Calculate Proof Test Coverage
  • by Dr. William Goble, CFSE
  • Thursday, October 16, 2014
  • Certification

How to Calculate Proof Test Coverage

Most engineers who design and verify safety instrumented functions (SIFs) understand how hard it is to design a manual proof test with high effectiveness (also called high proof test coverage). Those folks who understand that a proof test is not likely to detect all failures never use simplified equations…

Read More...

I Don’t Want No D*** Diagnostics!

After a false trip incident, I heard a control engineer express his displeasure with the automatic diagnostics in a new safety rated transmitter.  The transmitter diagnostics were annunciated by sending the analog current out of range.  In this case, the current went to 3.6 milliamps.  The problem was that…

Read More...