The indoor environment and its natural dynamics in small Spanish historical churches such as the studied here depend on the variations of outdoor climate and the moisture dynamics of walls, built with different materials. Such indoor environments are impacted by local factors, which may put at risk the conservation of a church's cultural assets. Natural ventilation in spring, the presence of people and especially the wintertime use of ageing heating system induce substantial fluctuations in indoor environments primarily affecting the stability of relative humidity (RH). RH is the physical parameter that can induce efflorescence as well as plaster blistering and detachment in its inside walls, drying and cracking in the timber and efflorescence and disgregation in the carved dolostone.Where the RH inside building is not high, as in the present case, natural and induced fluctuations may lower it considerably (<25 %), which is detrimental to conservation and human well-being both. Human presence partially counters the steep declines in RH attributable to heating in winter and warm, dry summer weather, although the trade-off is a rise in CO 2 levels inside the church.Heating induces substantial changes in the T and RH on the high altar and in the upper areas of the nave, while natural ventilation affects the RH at the base of the church and favours the elimination of CO 2 . The results obtained have allowed us to develop a series of recommendations that might be useful for the preventive conservation of such historic buildings, without compromising human comfort.
Most historic churches are characterised by low thermal efficiency due primarily to their architectural design and the traditional materials used in their construction. Heating the huge volumes of air involved may be more or less effective depending on the HVAC system used. Up until very recently, traditional heating has been the system of choice in Spanish churches. The present study analysed the parish church at Talamanca de Jarama (a village on the outskirts of Madrid), where the forced hot-air system was found to induce wide fluctuations in indoor thermal-hygrometric (T/RH) conditions, in turn translating into the temporal and horizontal stratification of temperature and relative humidity. As a result, the thermal comfort sought for parishioners is not reached, for the air remains cold at pew height while heat accumulates in the upper area of the church. A three-dimensional sensor network was designed to monitor these conditions. Suspended from helium balloons, the sensors could record the indoor air temperature and humidity without causing any damage whatsoever to church property.
The structure of historic buildings and the materials used in their construction, along with outdoor conditions , affect indoor temperature and humidity. The walls of San Juan Bautista Church at Talamanca de Jarama, Madrid, Spain, exhibit differences in water absorption, whose explanation is to be found in the various types of construction involved in its over seven centuries of building history, the weather conditions and the walls orientation. The south wall fluctuations in inner temperature and humidity produce 11-16 h thermal lag and a very low decrement factor ensuring comfortable interiors all year round with minimal fluctuations in temperature.
This article describes the use of non-or minimally destructive methods to study damp in San Juan Bautista Church at Talamanca de Jarama in the Spanish province of Madrid. The combination of ground penetrating radar (GPR), electrical resistivity tomography (ERT) and wireless sensor network (WSN) techniques provided sub-surface information, while data on wall surfaces were collected with contact hygrometry and infrared thermography. The respective findings and ranges of observation were interrelated to identify the decay associated with the damp and determine the advantages and drawbacks of each instrumental method. 1. 2. METHODS The study objectives were pursued with several non-invasive monitoring instruments, including data loggers, electrical conductivity and resistivity meters, infrared thermographic cameras and ground-penetrating radar antennas. This section describes the study scenario, along with the techniques and deployment schemes used. The building analysed in the case study was chosen in light of the intense damp of uncertain origin present in its walls. As several possible sources of the problem were considered, including indoor variability, leakage, the rise of capillary water and the type of construction material used, monitoring techniques based on different physical principles (such as resistivity or wave propagation) were used at different depth ranges.
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