Sustainable Innovation in Ceiling: Exploring the Environmental Benefits of a New Plaster–Rock Wool Layered Recycled Composite
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsThe paper presents interesting research to provide cost reduction and the reduction of energy consumption to produce virgin plaster for ceilings. I would like you to, please, address the following issue with this idea in your manuscript:
How safe for people would these ceiling plasters be, where waste rock wool is so close to the plaster outer surface of the board? What about the rock wool particles being exposed over time as these boards are only 2 cm thick? What would happen if the waste rock wool particles from these boards, which are supposed to be fitted over our heads, were possibly inhaled?
While reading the manuscript, I entered my comments into your PDF. I will attach it to the review. In brief: The quality of writing is very poor as if nobody has proofread the text, neither from the engineering / professional aspect nor the linguistic one:
- Strength units should be MPa, not newtons.
- Copy-pasted figure captions left unedited.
- There are 2.5 lines of instructions for authors from the template left in chapter Results.
- Language hard to understand, phrases used that do not belong to English, unprofessional terminology (Fe2O3 = “iron”), self-implied (local) terms, etc.
- Taking a picture of two bowls on some old newspaper, and a bag of 5 L gardening substrate, does not appear appropriate for a scientific paper in a reputable scientific journal.
- Inflation of references in the Introduction (grouping 8 references in one) should be replaced with 2 – 3 informative selected sentences linked to 2 or 3 references.
- There are numerous missing words, wrong grammar, endless typos like missing punctuation, capitalization mistakes, forgotten subscripts, etc.
Comments for author File: 
Comments.pdf
The authors must extensively correct their manuscript, as instructed above and in the comments inserted in the manuscript PDF. I do recommend final proofreading by a native speaker or by a language professional.
Author Response
The paper presents interesting research to provide cost reduction and the reduction of energy consumption to produce virgin plaster for ceilings. I would like you to, please, address the following issue with this idea in your manuscript:
Authors would like to thank the reviewer for the comments that will improve the quality of this manuscript.
How safe for people would these ceiling plasters be, where waste rock wool is so close to the plaster outer surface of the board? What about the rock wool particles being exposed over time as these boards are only 2 cm thick? What would happen if the waste rock wool particles from these boards, which are supposed to be fitted over our heads, were possibly inhaled?
Thank you for the questions. Glass wool placed in the outer surface of ceilings It’s widely used since several years ago. Glass wool is usually placed on top of the ceiling as an extra insulation in both, dwellings, and offices. In that situations, glass wool is not attached to the ceiling, thus allowing particles and even the whole piece to move along the ceiling. In this study and obviously for visual reasons, glass wool exposed face would be in the non-visible face of the ceiling. See image 1
See Image 2
Ceilings are not usually handled. Except for some maintenance actions or replacement, it remains in the same place without suffering any modifications. There exist higher and worse concerns in our houses we are exposed to before to worry about an unexposed glass wool.
While reading the manuscript, I entered my comments into your PDF. I will attach it to the review. In brief: The quality of writing is very poor as if nobody has proofread the text, neither from the engineering / professional aspect nor the linguistic one:
- Strength units should be MPa, not newtons.
Regarding the plates flexural strength, both, standard and machine used measure kN as the load applied to the samples.
- Copy-pasted figure captions left unedited.
Corrected
- There are 2.5 lines of instructions for authors from the template left in chapter Results.
Corrected, thank you
- Language hard to understand, phrases used that do not belong to English, unprofessional terminology (Fe2O3 = “iron”), self-implied (local) terms, etc.
A thorough revision of English has been conducted.
- Taking a picture of two bowls on some old newspaper, and a bag of 5 L gardening substrate, does not appear appropriate for a scientific paper in a reputable scientific journal.
Images have been replaced.
- Inflation of references in the Introduction (grouping 8 references in one) should be replaced with 2 – 3 informative selected sentences linked to 2 or 3 references.
Thank you for the comment. References have been replaced and split.
- There are numerous missing words, wrong grammar, endless typos like missing punctuation, capitalization mistakes, forgotten subscripts, etc.
A careful review of grammar has been conducted.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsThe contribution presents a new layered material based on gypsum and other additives for ceiling plasters. At the same time, the authors present their machine solution facilitating the processing process. This article describes this production machine and how it works. Next, a study of several compositions of the created composite is presented. The layered materials were subjected to both physical and mechanical tests in order to verify their suitability for processing prefabs. Let us emphasize that this is a very current issue. The reviewed contribution has a classic structure. The title of the post is apt and catchy. The abstract of the contribution is long enough and at the same time concise, it describes the issue very well. The text of the contribution is divided into five basic parts. In my opinion, the individual parts of the contribution are well balanced and basically describe the issue well. The English used is understandable and error-free. The attached tables, images and graphs are clear and appropriately complement the text of the presented issue. Designed and used procedures and analyses are applied correctly. I positively evaluate the large amount of cited literature. In my opinion, the presented conclusions are interesting, the obtained results enrich the presented area and may be of interest to the technical public. Let us note that the created ceiling plaster with a layer of gypsum and glass wool represents an interesting step towards sustainable construction. Thanks to its ecological advantages, this material not only offers a technically advanced solution, but also significantly contributes to environmental protection and sustainable development. In my opinion, the peer-reviewed contribution can be published in its current form. However, I would recommend the authors to think about adding more data. It can be reasonably assumed that its attractiveness will increase.
• Are there other approaches in the presented area? For example, other or other additional materials to improve the properties of the mixtures.
• It would certainly be advisable to supplement the post with a more detailed description of the test technique and test procedures.
• Did the authors implement other testing methods? Admixtures will clearly affect other physical properties as well.
• What will be the economic benefit of using the given technology? Will the carbon footprint be significantly reduced?
• How will the authors proceed in the presented area?
• Will an application manual for construction practice be compiled?
Author Response
The contribution presents a new layered material based on gypsum and other additives for ceiling plasters. At the same time, the authors present their machine solution facilitating the processing process. This article describes this production machine and how it works. Next, a study of several compositions of the created composite is presented. The layered materials were subjected to both physical and mechanical tests to verify their suitability for processing prefabs. Let us emphasize that this is a very current issue. The reviewed contribution has a classic structure. The title of the post is apt and catchy. The abstract of the contribution is long enough and at the same time concise, it describes the issue very well. The text of the contribution is divided into five basic parts. In my opinion, the individual parts of the contribution are well balanced and basically describe the issue well. The English used is understandable and error-free. The attached tables, images and graphs are clear and appropriately complement the text of the presented issue. Designed and used procedures and analyses are applied correctly. I positively evaluate the large amount of cited literature. In my opinion, the presented conclusions are interesting, the obtained results enrich the presented area and may be of interest to the technical public. Let us note that the created ceiling plaster with a layer of gypsum and glass wool represents an interesting step towards sustainable construction. Thanks to its ecological advantages, this material not only offers a technically advanced solution, but also significantly contributes to environmental protection and sustainable development. In my opinion, the peer-reviewed contribution can be published in its current form. However, I would recommend the authors to think about adding more data. It can be reasonably assumed that its attractiveness will increase.
Authors would like to thank the reviewer for the assessment done to our manuscript. We definitively consider the possibility of adding some of the suggestions made.
- Are there other approaches in the presented area? For example, other or other additional materials to improve the properties of the mixtures.
As described in literature, most of the studies use fiber-shaped addition or chemical foaming agents to improve this composites but adding them to this study would have added too many variables to achieve valid conclusions.
- It would certainly be advisable to supplement the post with a more detailed description of the test technique and test procedures.
Test techniques and procedures are well known by most of the researchers in this field. As this manuscript is long enough, describe methods and tests would not say anything new to the manuscript and would make it more difficult to follow.
- Did the authors implement other testing methods? Admixtures will clearly affect other physical properties as well.
As the aim of this study is only to set the suitability of this composites for ceilings, only properties affecting precast ceiling have been evaluated. As marked in conclusions, sound absorption tests would be also appropriate to conduct but for now we don’t have access to that tests yet.
- What will be the economic benefit of using the given technology? Will the carbon footprint be significantly reduced?
Section 4, discussion and 5, conclusions have been rewritten and these concepts have been clarified. Thank you for the questions, they will make the manuscript better.
- How will the authors proceed in the presented area?
We keep working in developing plaster-based composites as it is our research field.
- Will an application manual for construction practice be compiled?
A manual for construction practice could be compiled. It will require time though. Thank you for the idea.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsDear Authors,
You have addressed the comments I typed into the Susy online form field. I also realize you have not seen the comments inserted in your manuscript PDF. So, I will reattach the manuscript PDF with my comments. Please, correct the manuscript as instructed in the comments.
(In your revised manuscript I noticed that the first image in Table 2 got cropped, and Figures 6 and 7 are now blurred. Check it too.)
Comments for author File: Comments.pdf
Although you have replied that a careful review of grammar has been conducted, English grammar does need to be corrected by a language expert (e.g. “this materials”).
Author Response
Authors want to apologize for the mistakes found along the manuscript and thank the reviewer for his thorough review of the manuscript.
All comments and suggestions have been added/replaced Except for:
Affiliation. Our institution makes us use the spanish affiliation. If you kindly check our previous work, you will see always the spanish affiliation written . The same for Aknowledgements.
Composites apparent density is different to E-35 binder powder as the additions modifiy the samples content and final weight.
Conclusions were remaked. Statement regarding the use of cardboards was also removed.
I replaced dash for a proper minus sign using word symbols.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 3
Reviewer 1 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsDear Authors, I wish you a lot of success. Best regards
Comments on the Quality of English LanguageAs a courtesy to the readers, having the text checked by a language expert before publishing it in a foreign language would be nice.
