The effect of contacting material thermal conductivity on the computation of gap and contact thermal resistance
The interfaces between joints in many engineering applications involving heat transfer are composed of regions of good contacts and regions of finite size gaps where the regions of good contacts also contain microscopic gaps. The computation of the thermal contact resistance for such a joint is simplified by the assumption of an isothermal condition at the two contacting surfaces. The applicability of such an assumption for contacts between materials of different thermal conductivity has been studied numerically. The study shows that as the ratio of thermal conductivities, k{sub 1}/k{sub 2} (k{sub 1} {gt} k{sub 2}), is increased, the conditions at the interface depart from the isothermal assumption with the heat flux becoming more uniform across the joint and the temperature difference varying by a larger magnitude. This effect is more pronounced as the width of the gaps becomes larger for the same area of contact. This suggests that the modeling of the joint contact resistance should therefore be based on average temperatures for the contacting surfaces.
- Research Organization:
- New Jersey Inst. of Tech., Newark, NJ (US)
- OSTI ID:
- 20002409
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-990805--
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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