Teaching basic control concepts with a home-made thermal system

In this work we show how to build a home-made thermal system, and how we can use it in order to reinforce some basic concepts in control systems. Some of the concepts explored using the system are: identification based on step and frequency responses, the effect of basic control actions and the design, and implementation of analog controllers using operational amplifiers. In addition, we expose a set of advantages and disadvantages related with the laboratory experience documented here.