Temperature measurement of mineral melt by means of a high-speed camera

This paper presents a temperature evaluation method by means of high-speed, visible light digital camera visualization and its application to the mineral wool production process. The proposed method adequately resolves the temperature-related requirements in mineral wool production and significantly improves the spatial and temporal resolution of measured temperature fields. Additionally, it is very cost effective in comparison with other non-contact temperature field measurement methods, such as infrared thermometry. Using the proposed method for temperatures between 800°C and 1500°C, the available temperature measurement range is approximately 300 K with a single temperature calibration point and without the need for camera setting adjustments. In the case of a stationary blackbody, the proposed method is able to produce deviations of less than 5 K from the reference (thermocouple-measured) temperature in a measurement range within 100 K from the calibration temperature. The method was also tested by visualization of rotating melt film in the rock wool production process. The resulting temperature fields are characterized by a very good temporal and spatial resolution (18,700 frames per second at 128 pixels×328 pixels and 8000 frames per second at 416 pixels×298 pixels).