It's not just the design that's changed; after all, it's hard to squeeze any new emotions into a metallic grey box with rounded corners and a glass front. The focus has been on what WEISS chambers simply do best. Since at least these two interesting articles have been written about their merits (link 1 and 2), let's take a look at the new chamber through a purely subjective view from the field.
We entrusted the new ClimeEvent C2 climate chamber with a volume of 340 litres and a temperature range of -70 °C to +180 °C to some of the most competent hands, the test engineers of Robert Bosch, spol. s r.o. in České Budějovice, from the development department. As there are approximately 90 chambers of different generations in this department, we were confident that the chamber would pass the rigorous comparison and stress test. And after 700 hours of operation, we are already able to present some relevant results.
First of all, observations on the ergonomics of control and handling of the device as such.
Although the WEBSEASON® control panel display has grown by 3 inches in diagonal, its location - relatively low on the door - is not ideal for operators of all sizes. The display looks elegant in its glass frame with rounded corners, but does not give the impression of sturdiness when tilted. But the truth is that today's work is all about remote access and the chamber can be conveniently operated from the desk via SIMPATI control software. Alternatively, by entering its IP address into a browser, the WEBSEASON® panel interface can be mirrored and used. Operation of the chamber is therefore manageable from a mobile phone, just like chatting or emailing.
For many years, the test area of our chambers, or rather the protuberances on its sides used for seating the shelves, was the hallmark at first sight. This facilitated the handling of the shelves and the daily routine when using the chambers.
These protuberances were placed at fixed positions and limited our choice of positions for the entry ports on the other hand. In the new chamber, the shelves are mounted on removable rails. When changing the position of the shelves, it is therefore necessary to first unhook these rails from of the grooves in the corners of the chamber and place them into the new plane then. This apparent inconvenience and step backwards, however, allows us virtually any choice for - even additional – entry ports placement.
The HOLAB technicians can help you with the possible addition of an entry port.
The LED status bar on the front panel indicating the status of the chamber has brought great response. However, we’ve got some bad news for the Knight Rider series fans. The chamber cannot be controlled by voice, nor can it produce a test report on its own and send it to the computer as a powerpoint presentation. That's still up to you. However, even with a quick glance from a distance, this gives you a constant overview of the operating status of the instrument (running, ready to run, test running and error message).
High humidity tests at high temperatures, for example 85 °C and 85% r.h. are a well-known scarecrow. This corresponds to about 300 g / 0.3 l of water per 1 m3 of space! For comparison, this is about 10 g / 0.01 l per cubic meter of volume at standard conditions of 23 °C and 50% r.h. Simply put, the problem is that there is really a lot of water in the space during these tests. And since we have often dealt with the problem of this water dispersing on the dry-bulb thermometer of the psychrometer sensor in the form of fine droplets, causing unwanted peaks in the humidity graphs in the past, we were all anxious to see how the new humidity control system would handle this test. After about a week of testing, the engineers from České Budějovice sent the first results and looking at the humidity graphs we initially thought someone had drawn them. The change of the position of the dry and wet bulb, as well as the improvement of the airflow and control via absolute humidity (formerly relative), has borne fruit.
The new generation of WEISS TECHNIK climate chambers can easily build on the success of its predecessors and become an integral part of weather simulation test laboratories in the future.
Many thanks go to our good friends and partners from Robert Bosch, spol. s r.o. in České Budějovice and, of course, to the developers and technicians of the WEISS TECHNIK company.
If you are interested to get more information about ClimeEvent C2, please do not hesitate to contact us!
