Heat penetration testing
Thermal Validation
01. Temperature or heat distribution...>>
03. Heat penetration testing
The final stage of any thermal validation is to carry out sufficient repeat testing of the product to ensure that the characteristics of the product are understood and can be allowed for in design of a safe heat process.
Such testing is carried out according to customer requirements, industry guidelines or national legislation. However, all these guidelines tend to request very low levels of testing which are only safe when used in conjunction with specially prepared samples designed to represent the low end of the product heating range. Choosing such conditions requires considerable experience, especially when dealing with complex formulated products.
Additional safety margins can be added at the data analysis stage by adding “what if” scenarios into the calculations carried out.
Ultimately the skill of thermal process design is communication between the thermal process specialist and the production site so that sufficient allowance for “worst case” scenarios is designed into processes without them being so excessive that product quality is unnecessarily damaged.