Study of Thermal Characteristics of a Composite Specimen Experimentally and by Using Finite Element Method

Abstract

This research deals with the study of the effect of fibers volumefraction and fibers orientation on the thermal conductivity and wall surfacetemperatures for composite specimen in form of Lee’s disk by usingexperimental work and finite element technique. The results show thatthe thermal conductivity increases with increasing fiber volume fraction ofthe composite specimen, and in the longitudinal direction is larger than inthe lateral fiber direction.The experimental results indicated that the largestvalue of the thermal conductivity for the composite specimen was (0.611W/m.°c) at (Vf = 40 %) in the longitudinal direction, while the lowest valuewas (0.195 W/m.°c) at (Vf = 10 %) in the lateral direction. Also the resultsshow that the maximum difference for the thermal conductivity between theexperimental work and finite element method was ( 7 % ) at ( Vf = 10 % )in the lateral direction while the minimum value was ( 3.5 % ) at ( Vf = 40% ) in the longitudinal direction.