DESCRIPTION

Technical Description

Heat conduction is one of the three basic forms of heat transfer. According to the second law of thermodynamics, heat is always transferred from the higher energy level to the low energy level. If the temperature of a body does not change despite continuous addition or removal of heat, this is known as steady-state heat conduction.

WL 420 offers basic experiments for targeted teaching on the topic of heat conduction through various metals. To this end, one of eleven samples is used. The upper region of the sample is heated by an electrical heater and the lower section cooled by a Peltier element. Heat conduction occurs through the respective sample from top to bottom. Two samples can be inserted into the experimental unit at the same time, in order to investigate thermal conductivity through multi-layered metals. Perfectly matched components ensure rapid heating and trouble-free measurements.

The temperature of the metal samples is taken on the top and bottom by means of thermocouples. The microprocessor-based instrumentation is well protected in the housing. The GUNT software consists of a software for system operation and for data acquisition and an educational software. With explanatory texts and illustrations the educational software ignificantly aids the understanding of the theoretical principles. The unit is connected to the PC via USB.

The well-structured instructional material sets out the fundamentals and provides a step-by-step guide through the experiments.

Learning Objectives / Experiments

- time dependency until the steady state is reached
- calculate the thermal conductivity k of different metals
- calculate the thermal resistance of the sample
- heat transfer with different samples connected in series
- effect of sample length on heat transfer