Heated quartz microbalance to study thermally deposited calcareous scale

The scaling effect can affect drastically all equipment where water is used. In general, the phenomenon is amplified with hot fluids or hot pipes as, for example, conditions found in the heat exchangers. Thus, dramatic damages can occur that lead to dangerous economic consequences. The basic idea in this article is to promote the development of tools that can characterize the scaling power under certain conditions. A sophisticated heated quartz crystal microbalance was built and its performance was evaluated. It was shown that the scale must be deposited onto the sensor surface in an identic way compared with current scaling deposition conditions and the kinetics of deposition evaluated thanks to the microbalance response.