Experimental Investigation of Thermal Performance of XPS Insulated Exterior Walls

In this study, the thermal performances of the outer walls built with bricks were investigated experimentally using XPS thermal insulation boards. In the construction of the walls, 13.5 cm thick horizontal perforated bricks were used. Three different thicknesses were chosen as XPS thermal insulation board thickness. The thermal performance of the outer walls was determined using the hot box method (according to EN ISO 8990). In the hot box experiment, outdoor temperature was chosen as -5 degrees C and indoor temperature as 27 degrees C. Five different walls were built for the experimental study. These are respectively; uninsulated and plastered on the inside, 1 are uninsulated and plastered on both sides and insulated with 3 XPS boards (3, 4 and 5 cm thick). Wall surface temperatures in cold and hot sections were measured for 480 minutes and the overall thermal conductivity coefficient (U value) of the walls was calculated according to EN ISO 8990. The most suitable thermal insulation material thickness was found to be 5 cm and U value was found to be 1.943 W/m(2)K on the walls that were heat insulated with XPS. U values of single-wall plastered (KD1) and two-surface plastered (KD-2) walls were obtained as 4.565 W/m(2)K and 4.364 W/m(2)K, respectively. According to the results of the statistical analysis, the increase in the thickness of the insulation on the walls using XPS thermal insulation material did not reveal a significant difference and XPS insulated walls were included in the same group. It was determined that the thermal performance of XPS insulated walls is quite high compared to non-insulated control walls.