Measurement of turbulent heat transfer coefficients using infrared thermography near ambient conditions and its quantitative error estimation

Infrared thermography is applied to the measurement of turbulent heat transfer in order to investigate its applicability under near-ambient conditions. Natural convection along a vertical smooth flat plate and forced convection along a smooth Aat plate are realized in a large darkroom, where individual heat transfer coefficients are quantitatively measured using infrared thermography in the laminar, the transition and the turbulent regions. The measurement error is then estimated using the uncertainty analysis based on ANSI/ASME PTC 19.1 - 1985 to confirm the accuracy. It is obvious from a series of application experiments and error analyses that the present technique is useful for estimating turbulent heat transfer quantitatively and dynamically. Infrared thermography is an appropriate measurement procedure for engineering applications because it can be applied to diagnose a two-dimensional and dynamical temperature field instantaneously and nondestructively.