scholarly journals Thermal characterization of different graphite polystyrene

2018 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 163-168 ◽  
Author(s):  
Á. Lakatos ◽  
I. Deák ◽  
U. Berardi

The development of high performance insulating materials incorporating nanotechnologies has enabled considerable decrease in the effective thermal conductivity. Besides the use of conventional insulating materials, such as mineral fibers, the adoption of new nano-technological materials such as aerogel, vacuum insulation panels, graphite expanded polystyrene, is growing. In order to reduce the thermal conductivity of polystyrene insulation materials, during the manufacturing, nano/micro-sized graphite particles are added to the melt of the polystyrene grains. The mixing of graphite flakes into the polystyrene mould further reduces the lambda value, since graphite parts significantly reflect the radiant part of the thermal energy. In this study, laboratory tests carried out on graphite insulation materials are presented. Firstly, thermal conductivity results are described, and then sorption kinetic curves at high moisture content levels are shown. The moisture up-taking behaviour of the materials was investigated with a climatic chamber where the relative humidity was 90% at 293 K temperature. Finally, calorific values of the samples are presented after combusting in a bomb calorimeter.

Energies ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (18) ◽  
pp. 5700
Author(s):  
Maatouk Khoukhi ◽  
Abeer Dar Saleh ◽  
Ahmed Hassan ◽  
Shaimaa Abdelbaqi

Although many advanced insulation materials have been recently developed, very few are eco-friendly and their production requires a substantial amount of energy and complex manufacturing processes. To address this issue, a bio-based thermal insulation material was developed using short- and long-grained puffed rice. A set of experiments was subsequently carried out to identify the best rice type and the optimal range for the most influential parameters (sample amount, temperature, and moisture level). Our findings revealed that short-grained rice exhibited greater puffing ability and was thus adopted in further material optimization experiments. These assessments indicated that the most optimal thermal conductivity of the insulation material and the highest puffing ratio was attained at 12–15% moisture, 260–270 °C temperature, and 15–18 g sample weight. The thermal properties, including thermal conductivity and fire reaction, and thermal performance of samples obtained using these parameters were similar to those of common insulation materials.


2021 ◽  
Vol 65 (2-4) ◽  
pp. 230-235
Author(s):  
Tullio de Rubeis ◽  
Giovanni Pasqualoni ◽  
Domenica Paoletti ◽  
Dario Ambrosini

The thermal characterization of building envelope materials is a crucial phase in understanding the building energy performance, and it is commonly evaluated through the thermal transmittance, often synthetically indicated as U-value. There are several ways to experimentally assess the U-value of insulating materials and multi-layers systems, usually defined by means of experimental in-situ heat flux measurements, where, however, a considerable variation of the boundary conditions may occur, making the measurement difficult. In this work, the experimental thermal characterization of different insulating materials applied to an X-lam wall is presented. The analysis is carried out using a Guarded Hot Box, which allowed to reproduce real, repeatable, and controlled operating conditions. Two different insulating materials were selected: expanded polystyrene (EPS) with graphite and hemp. The experimental tests were carried out by imposing a temperature difference reproducing the common operating conditions (0°C in cold chamber and 20°C in hot chamber). Steady-state conditions (constant temperature in the chambers) have been imposed to determine the thermal properties of the multi-layer systems. The tests, lasted 72 hours each, showed U-values equal to 0.15 W/m2K ± 3.1% for EPS with graphite and 0.19 W/m2K ± 3.1% for hemp.


Author(s):  
Keivan Etessam-Yazdani ◽  
Mehdi Asheghi

Experimental measurement of thermal conductivity is considered the most reliable tool for the study of phonon transport in ultra-thin silicon structures. While there has been a great success in thermal conductivity measurement of ultra-thin silicon layers down to 20 nm over the past decade, it is not clear if the existing techniques and tools can be extended to the measurements of sun 100 Angstrom layers. In this paper, an analytical study of the feasibility of electrical Joule heating and thermometry in patterned metal bridges is presented. It is concluded that thermal conductivity of silicon layers as thin as 5 nm can be obtained (uncertainty 20%) by performing steady-state measurements using an on-substrate nanoheater structure. The thermal characterization of silicon layers as thin as 1 nm may be possible using frequency domain measurements.


Buildings ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (5) ◽  
pp. 81
Author(s):  
Cassandra Lafond ◽  
Pierre Blanchet

The energy efficiency of buildings is well documented. However, to improve standards of energy efficiency, the embodied energy of materials included in the envelope is also increasing. Natural fibers like wood and hemp are used to make low environmental impact insulation products. Technical characterizations of five bio-based materials are described and compared to a common, traditional, synthetic-based insulation material, i.e., expanded polystyrene. The study tests the thermal conductivity and the vapor transmission performance, as well as the combustibility of the material. Achieving densities below 60 kg/m3, wood and hemp batt insulation products show thermal conductivity in the same range as expanded polystyrene (0.036 kW/mK). The vapor permeability depends on the geometry of the internal structure of the material. With long fibers are intertwined with interstices, vapor can diffuse and flow through the natural insulation up to three times more than with cellular synthetic (polymer) -based insulation. Having a short ignition times, natural insulation materials are highly combustible. On the other hand, they release a significantly lower amount of smoke and heat during combustion, making them safer than the expanded polystyrene. The behavior of a bio-based building envelopes needs to be assessed to understand the hygrothermal characteristics of these nontraditional materials which are currently being used in building systems.


Author(s):  
Shiladitya Chakravorty ◽  
Bahgat Sammakia ◽  
Varaprasad Calmidi

Improved performance of semiconductor devices in recent years has resulted in consequent increase in power dissipation. Hence thermal characterization of components becomes important from an overall thermal design perspective of the system. This study looks at a high performance non-isolated point of load power module (a DC to DC converter) meant for advanced computing and server applications. Thermal characteristics of the module were experimentally analyzed by placing the power module on a bare test board (with no insulation) inside a wind tunnel with thermocouples attached to it. There were three devices on this module that dissipate power. There were two FETs (Field Effect Transistors) and an inductor which can be considered as sources. The consolidated power dissipation from the module was calculated by measuring the input voltage and input current while keeping the output voltage and current constant. Temperatures at various points on the module and the test card were recorded for different air flow velocities and overall power dissipation. Subsequently this set up was numerically analyzed using a commercially available computational fluid dynamics (CFD) code with the objective of comparing the results with experimental data previously obtained.


1992 ◽  
Vol 32 (17) ◽  
pp. 1236-1241 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Jaffe ◽  
M. Ishaq Haider ◽  
Joseph Menczel ◽  
Joseph Rafalko

Energies ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (17) ◽  
pp. 5223
Author(s):  
Oleksandra Hotra ◽  
Svitlana Kovtun ◽  
Oleg Dekusha ◽  
Żaklin Grądz

This article discusses an express control method that allows in situ measurements of the thermal conductivity of insulation materials. Three samples of the most common thermal insulation materials, such as polyurethane, extruded polystyrene, and expanded polystyrene, were studied. Additionally, optical and organic glasses were investigated as materials with a stable value of thermal conductivity. For the measurement of thermal conductivity, the express control device, which implements the differential method of local heat influence, was used. The case studies were focused on the reduction of fluctuations of the measured signals caused by different influencing factors using wavelet transform. The application of wavelet transform for data processing decreased the thermal conductivity measurement’s relative error for organic glass SOL and optical glasses TF-1 and LK-5. The application of wavelet transform thermal conductivity measurement data for polyurethane, extruded polystyrene, and expanded polystyrene allowed to reduce twice the duration of express control while maintaining the same level of measurement error. The results of the investigation could be used to increase the accuracy in express control of the thermal conductivity of insulation materials by improving the data processing. This approach could be implemented in software and does not require a change in the design of the measuring equipment or the use of additional tools.


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