Temperature profile measurement applications of moving webs and roll structures with intelligent roll embedded sensor technology

An intelligent roll for sheet and roll cover temperature profiles is a mechatronic system consisting of a roll in a web handling machine that is also used as a transducer for sensing cross-machine direction (CD) profiles. The embedded temperature sensor strips are mounted under or inside the roll cover, covering the full width of the roll’s cross-dimensional length. The sensor system offers new opportunities for online temperature measurement through exceptional sensitivity and resolution, without adding external measurement devices. The measurement is contacting, making it free from various disturbances affecting non-contacting temperature measurements, and it can show the roll cover’s internal temperatures. This helps create applications that have been impossible with traditional technology, with opportunities for process control and condition monitoring. An application used for process analysis services without adding a roll cover is made with “iRoll Portable Temperature” by mounting the sensor on the shell in a helical arrangement with special taping. The iRoll Temperature sensors are used for various purposes, depending on the application. The two main targets are the online temperature profile measurement of the moving web and the monitoring of the roll covers’ internal temperatures. The online sheet temperature profile has its main utilization in optimizing moisture profiles and drying processes. This enables the removal of speed and runnability bottlenecks by detecting inadequate drying capacity across the sheet CD width, the monitoring condition of the drying equipment, the optimization of drying energy consumption, the prevention of unnecessary over-drying, the optimization of the float drying of coating colors, and the detection of reasons for moisture profile errors. This paper describes this novel technology and its use cases in the paper, board, and tissue industry, but the application can be extended to pulp drying and industries outside pulp and paper, such as the converting and manufacture of plastic films.

Internal Insulation of Preservation Worthy Facades

With international awareness of the need to decrease greenhouse gas emissions, the Danish government set a target to be fossil fuel-free by 2050. To achieve that, existing buildings will need to be retrofitted with energy-saving technologies such as improved thermal insulation. In Denmark, a larger mass of the building stock from around 1850 to the 1940s is preservation worthy. The construction is typically solid brick walls with wooden beams on the floors. This creates a challenge for energy retrofitting since the external facades cannot be altered. The application of internal insulation can influence the temperature and moisture profile of the wall. Moisture builds up in the interface between the original brick wall, and the insulation layer can create an environment where mould can grow. Previous research also demonstrated a risk of moisture build-up at the beam-ends when internal insulation is applied. Saint-Gobain ISOVER has, together with DTU, spent five years developing a new system, ISOVER RetroWall System, which addresses these problems. The presented work will include a short introduction to the concept, results and conclusions from the field test and presentation of two sites with the finished system in use.

Risk of Using Capillary Active Interior Insulation in a Cold Climate

The retrofitting of cultural heritage buildings for energy efficiency often requires the internal thermal insulation of external walls. Most of the in situ studies of capillary active interior insulation were performed in mild oceanic climate regions, and they showed an excellent performance. However, as a large part of Central–Eastern Europe belongs to a continental climate with cold winters and long periods of temperatures below the freezing temperature, the applicability of the capillary active interior insulation in cold climate was studied. The hydrothermal behaviour of the three walls was determined—each consists of one of three different interior insulations—and the original wall is made of historic regular solid bricks. Two interior thermal insulations were capillary active (aerated cellular concrete, calcium silicate) and one vapour-tight (glass foam). A hot box–cold box experiment and a steady-state model were used to demonstrate an increase in the original wall mass due to the water condensation only when the capillary active interior insulation is used. The combination of the water condensation and the low sub-zero temperature may lead to a risk of freeze–thaw damage to the original wall. The numerical simulation of the water vapour condensation for the considered walls for the Slovenian town Bled with sub-zero average winter temperatures was performed to obtain the whole temperature and moisture profile. It showed good agreement between an experimentally and numerically obtained amount of water condensation. The capillary active interior insulation proved to be unsuitable for improving the thermal insulation of buildings in cold continental climate, and only a vapour-tight system can be recommended.

Enhanced Estimation of Root Zone Soil Moisture at 1 km Resolution Using SMAR Model and MODIS-Based Downscaled AMSR2 Soil Moisture Data

Root zone soil moisture (RZSM) is an essential variable for weather and hydrological prediction models. Satellite-based microwave observations have been frequently utilized for the estimation of surface soil moisture (SSM) at various spatio-temporal resolutions. Moreover, previous studies have shown that satellite-based SSM products, coupled with the soil moisture analytical relationship (SMAR) can estimate RZSM variations. However, satellite-based SSM products are of low-resolution, rendering the application of the above-mentioned approach for local and pointwise applications problematic. This study initially attempted to estimate SSM at a finer resolution (1 km) using a downscaling technique based on a linear equation between AMSR2 SM data (25 km) with three MODIS parameters (NDVI, LST, and Albedo); then used the downscaled SSM in the SMAR model to monitor the RZSM for Rafsanjan Plain (RP), Iran. The performance of the proposed method was evaluated by measuring the soil moisture profile at ten stations in RP. The results of this study revealed that the downscaled AMSR2 SM data had a higher accuracy in relation to the ground-based SSM data in terms of MAE (↓0.021), RMSE (↓0.02), and R (↑0.199) metrics. Moreover, the SMAR model was run using three different SSM input data with different spatial resolution: (a) ground-based SSM, (b) conventional AMSR2, and (c) downscaled AMSR2 products. The results showed that while the SMAR model itself was capable of estimating RZSM from the variation of ground-based SSM data, its performance increased when using downscaled SSM data suggesting the potential benefits of proposed method in different hydrological applications.

A guide to eliminating baggy webs

Slack or baggy webs can cause misregistration, wrinkles, and breaks in printing and converting operations. Bagginess appears as non-uniform tautness in the cross direction (CD) of a paper web. The underlying cause is uneven CD tension profiles, for which there are few remedies once the paper is made. Precision measurements of CD tension profiles combined with trials on commercial paper machines have shown that uniform CD distribution of moisture, basis weight, and caliper profiles at the reel are key to avoiding bagginess. However, the most important but infrequently measured factor is the CD moisture profile entering the dryer section. Wetter areas entering the dryers are permanently elongated more than dry areas, leading to greater slackness in the finished paper. In storage, wound-in tension can amplify baggy streaks in paper near the surface of a roll and adjacent to the core. Unwrapped or poorly wrapped rolls exposed to low humidity environments may have baggy centers caused by moisture loss from the roll edges. All of the factors that impact bagginess have been incorporated in a mathematical model that was used to interpret the observations from commercial trials and can be used as a guide to solve future problems.

Profil Suhu dan Kadar Air Kayu dalam Pengeringan Oven Pemanas dan Gelombang Mikro (Temperature and Moisture Content Profiles of Woods in Heating and Microwave Ovens Drying)

This research aimed to evaluate the profile of temperature and moisture content in Pinus oocarpa wood being dried with heating oven and microwave oven. The size of samples were (25x70x120) mm3. The temperature profiles in heating oven and microwave oven drying were taken every 10 minutes and 0.5 minutes, respectively. The moisture profiles in heating oven and microwave oven drying were made in every 24 hours and 10 minutes, respectively. The heating oven was set at 60 °C, while microwave oven was set for 2 minutes intermittently with 5 minutes break. In microwave drying, the temperature inside the boards increased faster and higher compared to that in the heating oven, which resulted in a faster moisture movement to the board’s surface. The drying rate of pine increased 48-72 times in microwave compared to that in heating oven. The moisture content in the centre of boards being dried in heating oven was much higher than that of in the outer parts. On the other hand, the moisture profile in the woods being dried in microwave oven distributed more evenly.

Processes in the Unsaturated Zone by Reliable Soil Water Content Estimation: Indications for Soil Water Management from a Sandy Soil Experimental Field in Central Italy

Reliable soil moisture data are essential for achieving sustainable water management. In this framework, the performance of devices to estimate the volumetric moisture content by means dielectric properties of soil/water system is of increasing interest. The present work evaluates the performance of the PR2/6 soil moisture profile probe with implications on the understanding of processes involving the unsaturated zone. The calibration at the laboratory scale and the validation in an experimental field in Central Italy highlight that although the shape of the moisture profile is the same, there are essential differences between soil moisture values obtained by the calibrated equation and those obtained by the manufacturer one. These differences are up to 10 percentage points for fine-grained soils containing iron oxides. Inaccurate estimates of soil moisture content do not help with understanding the soil water dynamic, especially after rainy periods. The sum of antecedent soil moisture conditions (the Antecedent Soil moisture Index (ASI)) and rainfall related to different stormflow can be used to define the threshold value above which the runoff significantly increases. Without an accurate calibration process, the ASI index is overestimated, thereby affecting the threshold evaluation. Further studies on other types of materials and in different climatic conditions are needed to implement an effective monitoring network useful to manage the soil water and to support the validation of remote sensing data and hydrological soil models.

Estimates of tree root water uptake from soil moisture profile dynamics

Root water uptake (RWU), as an important process in the terrestrial water cycle, can help us to better understand the interactions in the soil–plant–atmosphere continuum. We conducted a field study monitoring soil moisture profiles in the rhizosphere of beech trees at two sites with different soil conditions. We present an algorithm to infer RWU from step-shaped, diurnal changes in soil moisture. While this approach is a feasible, easily implemented method for moderately moist and homogeneously textured soil conditions, limitations were identified during drier states and for more heterogeneous soil settings. A comparison with the time series of xylem sap velocity underlines that RWU and sap flow (SF) are complementary measures in the transpiration process. The high correlation between the SF time series of the two sites, but lower correlation between the RWU time series, suggests that soil characteristics affect RWU of the trees but not SF.