Energy Efficient, Highly Precise Cascade Dryness Control for Fibrous Tape by Induction-Based Surface Heating of a Rotating Steel Cylinder with Moving Inductors

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Very well-organized and structured research work focusing on dryness control for fibrous tape by induction-based surface heating of a rotating steel cylinder. The manuscript was prepared with IMRaD structure. It is easy to read, and the main research flow is clear. 

The title of the manuscript is informative and relevant. Abstract matches the rest of the article. 

The introduction section is well organized and presents motivation and proper background study; it is clear that the authors have a strong background about the topic.

Study methods are valid and reliable. The used units are appropriate. Tables and figures are relevant and clearly presented.

The conclusions answer the aims of the study and support empirical results.

The manuscript requires final proofread and correction of minor typos:

1- Blocks 1 and 2 in Figure 2 are blurry. 

2- The polarity of the DC source shown in figure 9 should be (+) and (-).

Author Response

 

Dear Sir,

We would like to thank you for your valuable comments and suggestions which significantly improved the quality of our paper. We revised the manuscript following all the your remarks by correcting ilustrations. Below we also addressed all remarks and questions included directly in the review form:

1. In Figure 8 (former 2) blurry blocks are removed.
2. In Figure 4 (former 9) we add the proper polarity of DC source.

Sincerelly yours.

 

 

Reviewer 2 Report

The present manuscript discusses novel numerical and experimental methods to control the dryness of fibrous tapes. I have made comments in PDF files to raise the quality of this work. Please revise your work with all comments made in PDF file and some important comments as follows:

 

1. The title should be precise and specific. It needs rephrasing. Currently, it does not give a full idea about your work.
2. The literature review is very poorly written. You need to mention some relevant past work and some current work.
3. Also mention what are the gaps in work and what is your solution to the unsolved problem.
4. You should make arguments on some methods and which is related to your work and how your work will add more value.
5. Give some information on how this novel method is efficient and how much efficiency was increased etc. It needs information in a quantitative manner not only in the theoretical aspect based on your research output.
6. Your work is based on simulation so the title must depict it.
7. Your numerical work should be very clear here. What type of numerical model and methodology has been used etc.
8. The literature review is very poorly written. It needs much discussion on the old method and new methods. Further what has been done and what is lacking. Further, what is your opinion about your new concept?
9. Why don't you add some previous work here and their method? It would be great if you make some arguments here about well-known mathematical methods.
10. Could you highlight the outcome of your research work? Not just a description of the method and process.
11. It would be great if you could add some point-wise summary of your work. Discuss your work and outcome in detail. Also mention what has been achieved from this work and how you solved an unsolved problem.
12. Go through all comments made in the PDF file.

 

Best of luck.

 

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

We would like to thank you for your valuable comments and suggestions which significantly improved the quality of our paper. We revised the manuscript following all your remarks included in the pdf file by correcting misleading parts, extending some descriptions and explanations, and adding lacking illustrations and other data. We hope that all these modifications will meet your expectations. Below we also addressed all remarks and questions included directly in the review form:

1. We extended the title of the paper making it more specific by adding the type of control we have applied and characterizing more precisely the way of induction heating we proposed.
2. We have carefully reviewed the literature corresponding to our research, focusing particularly on past and current achievements in this area, and reflected them to our work. As a result, we included 8 new items in the list of literature and referred to them in relevant parts of the manuscript.
3. We are convinced that the original contribution of our work lies at least in two areas. First, we proposed a unique method for the numerical modelling of induction heating of the rotating cylinder using moving inductors. This enabled to simulate of the effect of active power "blurring" on the surface of the cylinder while maintaining its thermal history. Second, we have developed the cascade dryness control system based on the temperature profile along the cylinder generatrix, serving as auxiliary information. The proposed approach ensured more than 30% faster response by the whole dryness control system which can improve the energy efficiency of the production process which can be crucial for some industrial branches like paper-making. We have added some statements in various parts of the manuscript, especially in Abstract and Conclusions, to depict in clear way the contribution of our work.
4. The method of induction heating of a rotating steel cylinder gives the possibility of using control systems that allow controlling the position and power of the inductors, which allows flexible shaping of the temperature profile of the surface of the cylinder along its generatrix. To our best knowledge, such an approach has not been used so far, especially for heating the rotating cylinder. 
5. As mentioned in answering remark no. 3, by introducing the temperature profile control subsystem to the cascade dryness control, we ensured more than 30% faster response by the whole dryness control system and a significant reduction (2 times less value) in the ITAE control performance index. These results are expressed in relation to the classical one-loop PI control frequently used in such cases.
6. As stated in answering remark no. 1, we added some specific terms in the title of the paper that make it more precise and better suited to its content. We agree that an important part of our research concerns the simulation issues but since we have also performed and described a substantial amount of experimental work, using the dedicated semi-industrial laboratory setup, we feel that limiting the title of the paper only to the simulation part of our research might have not reflected the full range of the reported work.
7. Detailed information concerning the type of numerical model and simulation methods has been added in section 3 of the manuscript. We did our best to explain the specificity of our approach to modelling of electromagnetic and thermal phenomena, in conditions of rotating cylinder and moving inductors. We also added some parameters’ values and gave the necessary information on the software we used.
8. We addressed this issue by answering remarks no. 4, 5 and no. 2. We also extended parts of the Conclusions section of the manuscript to point out the advantages of our solution. 
9. We addressed these issues by answering remark no. 2. Some new parts of text have been added especially in section 3.
10. The relevant extensions of Abstract and Conclusions have been done and some additional explanations have been added to Section 4 to highlight the main outcomes of our research.
11. The Conclusions section of the manuscript has been extended to point out the advantages of our solution.
12. All comments made in the pdf file have been carefully taken into account and relevant changes and complements have been introduced to the manuscript.

Sincerelly yours.

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

None.