EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN TO DETERMINE THERMAL DIFFUSIVITY OF A MATERIAL: AN ANALYSIS ON TRANSIENT HEAT CONDUCTION

Ashray Valsan, Darish Jeswin Dhas S, Sakthivel S, Joju Abraham

Abstract: Thermal diffusivity of any object is of prime importance as it decides the amount of heat energy required to be provided or removed from an object for it to attain the required temperature on its surface at a particular instant of time. Little has been done so far in devising a way of determining the thermal diffusivity directly without having to use costlier setups or be plagued by errors being piled up by multiplication of individual parameter errors. This paper suggests a simple experimental setup which can deduce the thermal diffusivity of a material directly instead of having to calculate the thermal conductivity and specific heat capacity of the materials. The setup model can be effectively used for determining relationship between heat energy stored within and the rate of heat transfer through the outer surface of specimen when there is no heat generation. An illustrative example for the use of the model is also presented with the material in cylindrical geometry with the subsequent differential equations derived. Apart from being simple and accurate, the setup is also highly economic making it a more viable choice. This experimental model could be used for alloys, ceramics and composite materials of various combination ratios

Keywords: Thermal diffusivity, Experimental model.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.15623/ijret.2015.0405059