Experimental Investigation on the Influence of Ambient Temperature on the Test Accuracy for the Differential Pressure Hydrostatic Levelling System

Hydrostatic levelling system (HLS) is widely used to monitor the settlement of major projects, such as high-speed railways, bridges, tunnels, dams, and nuclear power plants; ambient temperature is the most important influencing factor in the actual engineering settlement detection process. In order to systematically study the influence of ambient temperature TA on the test accuracy of the HLS, a test platform was built in the ambient temperature laboratory, and the influence of factors, including the amount of TA change, the rate of increase/decrease of TA, the expansion coefficient of the connecting pipe, and the distance of the measuring point, on the HLS test accuracy was quantitatively analyzed. The test results show that the elevation of a single HSL case has a linear correlation with the ambient temperature; when the temperature rise rate is greater than 0.1°C/min, the measured data are distorted due to incomplete development of material expansion. The temperature influence coefficient of a single HSL case is linearly related to the expansion coefficient deviation between the refrigerant and pipe; the test error of the double HLS case caused by TA is attributed to the expansion coefficient deviation of the pipe and the refrigerant between the base station and the measuring point. The relative temperature influence coefficient increases as distance measurement increases, and the HLS test error caused by TA will maintain a constant value when the distance measurement exceeds a certain value.