Design, development and testing of an apparatus for measuring thermal conductivity of aluminum and brass pipes

• Main Author: Castillo, Victoriano R.
• Format: text
• Language: English
• Published: Animo Repository 1988
• Subjects: Heat > Conduction > Measurement; Aluminum > Thermal conductivity > Measurement; Measuring instruments
• Online Access: https://animorepository.dlsu.edu.ph/etd_masteral/1198
• Institution: De La Salle University

This study was intended primarily to design, develop and test an apparatus for measuring thermal conductivity of aluminum and brass pipes using ipil-ipil charcoal as source of energy. It also aimed to determine the effect of varying the sizes of a pipe on thermal conductivity and find out if the percentage error in the thermal conductivity of the two pipes differ in each group. Eighteen samples were randomly selected from the two kinds of pipe. One-third of the nine samples from each kind had the same length and the same cross-section, the other one-third had different length and the same cross-section, and the remaining one-third had the same length and different cross-section. For each sample, the mass of aluminum calorimeter, aluminum stirrer, and water in the calorimeter were recorded the constant temperature of gas flowing inside the sample, temperature of outside surface of sample, and the temperature of water in the calorimeter were gathered and recorded from the start and every two minutes thereafter for ten minutes per trial. The thermal conductivity of each sample at every trial was computed and tabulated. Three trials were performed for each sample. The data were analyzed using t-test for inference about the mean of a population, matched pairs t-test, and one factor analysis of variance and were tested at 5 percent level of significance. Findings showed that there were no significant differences in the means of each group of nine observations of the thermal conductivity of aluminum and brass pipes when compared with the theoretical value. The range of thermal conductivity of aluminum pipe obtained was 185.5 to 230.0 J/s-m centigrade as compared with the theoretical value of 205.0 J/s-m centigrade. Percentage error ranges from 1.41 percent to 12.2 percent. For brass pipe, the range of thermal conductivity obtained was 98.8 to 116.6 J/s-m centigrade as compared with the theoretical value of 109.0 J/s-m-centigrade. Percentage error ranges from 3.3 percent to 9.36 percent. Test results also show