The extension of the traditional hands‐on laboratories to the Internet, in which labs are remotely accessible to the users to perform experiments, is still a challenge for education in engineering. In this paper, we present a remote refrigeration laboratory that allows students, trainees, and engineers to get acquainted with control aspects of mechanical refrigeration systems. Thanks to a university–industry partnership, the remote lab is hosted in an industrial site and it can be accessed by means of a client–server communication and an ad‐hoc designed LabVIEW‐based user interface, that allows to monitor and control the plant. The user can conduct both open‐ and closed‐loop experiments on a typical vapor compression cycle refrigeration system, testing different control architectures that range from standard regulators to data‐driven PID controllers.© 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Comput Appl Eng Educ 25:430–440, 2017; View this article online at http://www.wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/cae; DOI

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Remote laboratories allow students and trainees to fully access experiments while providing the necessary guidance and constraining operation to avoid dangerous situations. In this paper a remote laboratory for monitoring and controlling a typical mechanical refrigeration system is presented. A client-server communication is used to connect a local PC with the remote laboratory, and an ad-hoc, LabVIEW-based user interface allows to monitor and control the plant. The laboratory can be used as an experimental aid in the teaching of controller design for refrigeration systems. Examples ranging from open-loop to closed-loop tests on a typical vapour compression cycle refrigeration system are reported

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