It is near impossible to achieve a ‘fully’ adiabatic environment; therefore a calorimeter is only considered to be adiabatic when temperature losses of samples are not higher than 0.02 K/h. In order to prevent heat loss the surrounding environment needs to be controlled through providing insulation, heated containers or a combination of both. Adiabatic heat measurements are particularly useful in producing continuous heat of hydration curves which can be related to mass curing conditions, and it is this characteristic of adiabatic calorimetry that makes it the most practical for temperature predictions in hardening concrete.

 

In general the shape of the temperature profiles generated by semi-adiabactic calorimeters are initially similar to those of a fully-adiabatic system. However the profiles diverge as the heat losses increase and a peak is formed in the semi-adiabatic profile, which usually occurs within 24 h. The fully adiabatic profile continues to increase but the rate of the temperature rise decrease significantly after 24 h. A graphical representation of this behaviour can be seen in the figure Below.