Heat transfer performance of porous copper foam

The main objective of this study is to investigate the heat transfer characteristics of porous copper foams described as a function of temperature, TH geometry, porosity, ɛ thickness, t micro-structure and time, Ɵ. An experimental investigation which is based upon a modeling approach through the measurements of local temperatures by using thermal imaging camera along the x-y-z axis of the porous copper foam samples is conducted. This study characterizes a variety of plate type copper foam samples with 40 PPI and porosity, ɛ of 95 % ; samples with a size of 150 mm, (L) 30 mm, (W) and thicknesses of 3 mm, 4 mm and 5 mm and copper foil samples as a reference items with a size of 150 mm, (L) 30 mm, (W) and 0.4 mm thickness are studied at different heating surface temperatures, TH in the range of 50 ˚C ≤ TH ≤ 100 ˚C. The microstructures of the foams are characterized with a scanning electron microscopy (SEM). Thermal image analyses and time dependent local changing of the thermal conductivity, k heat capacity, C and thermal diffusivity, α are calculated. The experimental results showed that, k, C and α values of the porous copper foam and copper foil samples change between 140 W/m.K ≤ k ≤ 651 W/m.K and 32 W/m.K ≤ k ≤ 98 W/m.K, 250 J/K ≤ C ≤ 1270 J/K and 3 mm2/s ≤ α ≤ 42 mm2/s and 0.1 mm2/s ≤ α ≤ 0.8 mm2/s depending on the TH, t and Ɵ. Keywords : Copper Foam, Porosity, Thermal Conductivity, SEM, Thermal Analysis