Airflow in industrial bakery ovens can significantly influence the quality and consistency of baked products. Air flow data loggers from Reading Thermal can help you bake your products to perfection.
For nearly three decades, Reading Thermal, headquartered in Sinking Spring, Pennsylvania, has been focused on measuring and understanding the commercial baking process. We manufacture and support the SCORPION® 2 Data Logger, a baking industry standard.
By connecting our sensors and sensor arrays to the SCORPION® 2 Data Logger and sending them through the oven with the product, the system will capture the four key baking parameters: environmental temperature (including the temperature of both the air and the oven belt surface), heat flux (energy transfer), humidity, and air flow (velocity).
Importance of Air Flow
Your oven’s cooking performance depends on the air flow inside the oven. Measuring this baking parameter is important because, along with temperature and humidity, it influences the texture, firmness, coloration, and required baking time of the final product.
The air flow In a radiant oven comes from the moving conveyor, the exhaust system, and natural combustion air currents. In a convection oven, it comes primarily from the air distribution plenums. Air flow is crucial in this case because it directly controls the amount of heat delivered to the product.
Bakers can measure oven air flow with the SCORPION® 2 Air Velocity Sensor. The sensor array gives you a precise picture of air flow patterns inside the oven from side to side and end to end. The sensors collect product-level data while the array travels through the oven. The number of sensors you need will vary with the width of the conveyor.
Air Velocity Profiles will help you spot differences in air flow between baking zones, concentrated air velocities on isolated parts of the conveyor, and unwanted air currents at the entrance or exit of the oven that result in inconsistent baking.
It’s important to consider that the four key oven baking parameters are interrelated: temperature, air velocity, heat flux, and humidity. They work together to regulate the quality of your final product. For example, humidity is affected by temperature and air velocity. When you invest in the full-featured SCORPION® 2 Data Logger, you will be able to add sensors at any time to explore other oven variables.
If you lack adequate information about your commercial oven to make reliable decisions about your bakery processes and products, an air flow data logger such as the innovative SCORPION® 2 Air Velocity Sensor from Reading Thermal will help. Get in touch with us online or call our headquarters in Sinking Spring, Pennsylvania, at (610) 678-5890 Ext. 2 to learn more.