A keen understanding of the three basic laws of thermocouples: Homogeneous Materials, Intermediate Metals, and Successive or Intermediate Temperatures, can be helpful in weeding out potential sources of error in thermocouple measurement systems. It’s also valuable in properly selecting and applying the components commonly used to connect thermocouples to instruments. This coupled with an awareness of how cold junction compensation works and the limitations it imposes on our measurement and wiring practice, will go a long way towards improving thermocouple measurement accuracy.
