One could get an estimate of the thermal conductivity of a metal based on the electrical conductivity, however, thermal conductivity of metals has two components, one of electron conduction and the other lattice/phonon conduction, and the fractions/proportions vary with metals/elements and temperature.abdulbadii said:TL;DR Summary: Viable procedure to meter the heat conductive constant of a metal
What'd be practical method and/or portable, simple tool (like sort of electricians' multimeter) to meter the heat conductive constant of a metal?
Will you be able to insert a standard test sample (standard size and volume) into the meter, or do you want to be able to walk up to a metal wall and just measure its thermal conductivity somehow? If you cannot measure a standard sample size and shape, you can see what other variables will enter in, right?abdulbadii said:What'd be practical method and/or portable, simple tool (like sort of electricians' multimeter) to meter the heat conductive constant of a metal?
Thermal conductivity is a measure of a material's ability to conduct heat. It is defined as the rate at which heat flows through a unit area of a material, per unit thickness, for a temperature difference of one degree.
The SI unit for thermal conductivity is watts per meter-kelvin (W/m•K). However, other units such as calories per second-centimeter-kelvin (cal/s•cm•K) and British thermal units per hour-foot-degree Fahrenheit (BTU/h•ft•°F) are also commonly used.
The most common method for measuring thermal conductivity of a metal is the steady-state method, where a temperature gradient is applied to a metal sample and the rate of heat flow is measured. Other methods include the transient or non-steady-state method, which involves measuring the temperature change over time, and the hot-wire method, which uses a heated wire to measure thermal conductivity.
The thermal conductivity of a metal can be affected by various factors such as temperature, density, crystal structure, and impurities. Generally, higher temperatures and densities result in higher thermal conductivity, while impurities and defects can decrease thermal conductivity.
Measuring thermal conductivity is important for understanding and predicting how heat will be transferred in a material. This information is crucial in many fields, including engineering, materials science, and thermodynamics. It also plays a key role in the design and optimization of heat transfer systems and devices.