Interlaboratory study of the quality of water vapor sorption data for wood from automated sorption balances
Year: 2025
Type: article
Abstract: Automated sorption balances are widely used for characterizing the interaction of water vapor with hygroscopic materials. This paper is part of an interlaboratory study investigating the stability and performance of automated sorption balances. A previous paper in this study investigated the mass, temperature, and relative humidity (RH) stability of automated sorption balances by looking at the mass change of a non-hygroscopic sample over time. In this study, we examine the mass stability of wood samples held at constant RH for seven to ten days after a step change. The reason for the long hold times was to collect data to “operational equilibrium” where the change in mass is on the order of the inherent operational stability of the instrument. A total of 80 datasets were acquired from 21 laboratories covering absorption with final RH levels ranging from 10 to 95%. During these long hold times, several unusual behaviors were observed in the mass-vs-time curves. Deviations from expected sorption behavior were examined by fitting the data to an empirical sorption kinetics model and calculating the root mean square error (RMSE) between the observed and smoothed behavior. Samples that had a large RMSE relative to the median RMSE of the other datasets often had one of several types of errors: abrupt disturbances, diurnal oscillations, or long-term mass decline during an absorption step. In many cases, mass fluctuations were correlated with changes in the water reservoir temperature of the automated sorption balance. We discuss potential errors in sorption measurements on hygroscopic materials and suggest an acceptable level of RMSE for sorption data.
Source: Adsorption
Authors: Samuel L. Zelinka, Samuel V. Glass, Natalia Farkas, Emil E. Thybring, Michael Altgen, Lauri Rautkari, Simon Curling, Jinzhen Cao, Yujiao Wang, Tina Künniger, Gustav Nyström, Christopher Hubert Dreimol, Ingo Burgert, Mark G. Roper, Darren P. Broom, Matthew Schwarzkopf, Arief Yudhanto, Mohammad Subah, Gilles Lubineau, Maria Fredriksson, Wiesław Olek, Jerzy Majka, Nanna Bjerregaard Pedersen, Daniel J. Burnett, Armando R. Garcia, Frieder Dreisbach, Louis Waguespack, Jennifer Schott, Luis G. Esteban, Alberto García‑Iruela, Thibaut Colinart, Romain Rémond, Brahim Mazian, Patrick Perré, Lukas Emmerich
Institutions: Forest Products Laboratory, University of Copenhagen, Norwegian Institute of Bioeconomy Research, Aalto University, Bangor University, Beijing Forestry University, Empa, ETH Zurich, Institute for Building Materials, InnoRenew CoE, Baylor University, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, Lund University, Poznań University of Life Sciences, Royal Danish Academy – Architecture, Design, Conservation, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Université de Bretagne Sud, Institut de Recherche Dupuy de Lôme, Institut National de Recherche pour l'Agriculture, l'Alimentation et l'Environnement, Laboratoire d'Etudes et de Recherche sur le Matériau Bois, Université de Lorraine, Université Paris-Saclay, CentraleSupélec, Laboratoire de Génie des Procédés et Matériaux, University of Göttingen
Language: English
Subfield: Building and Construction
Field: Engineering
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: hybrid
Estimated APC paid: $4,090
Funder: U.S. Forest Service
OpenAlex ID: W4409415491