Case Studies in Construction Materials 8 (2018) 217–225

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Case Studies in Construction Materials

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Case study

Effect of the insulation materials filling on the thermal

T
performance of sintered hollow bricks under the air-conditioning
intermittent operation
⁎
Chaoping Houa, Xi Menga, Yanna Gaoa, , Wei Maob, Enshen Longb
a
College of Architecture and Urban-Rural Planning, Sichuan Agricultural University, Chengdu 610065, PR China
b
College of Architecture and Environment, Sichuan University, Chengdu 610065, PR China

AR TI CLE I NF O AB S T R A CT

Keywords: Wall insulation performance is an important factor affecting building energy consumption and
Insulation filling ratio indoor comfortable level. This study proposes that the insulation materials are filled into the
Insulation filling location cavities of the sintered hollow brick to replace the single insulation layer. The physical models of
Thermal performance typical walls were built by the hollow bricks filled with expanding polystyrene board (EPS) in
Sintered hollow bricks
cavities and wall thermal performance is numerically analyzed by the Finite Volume Method
under air-conditioning intermittent operation, which conforms to the actual operation rules of
air-conditioning. Results show that filling EPS in cavities is beneficial to improve the thermal
performance of the bricks, and the larger the EPS filling ratio, the higher the thermal perfor-
mance improvement. The EPS filling ratio increase has the higher sensitivity on inner surface
heat flow under the low EPS filling ratio, and filling EPS in the external cavities is optimum with
the decrement rate 5.92% higher than filling EPS in internal cavities for the EPS filling ratio of
20%, while filling EPS in internal and external cavities simultaneously is optimum with decre-
ment rate 2.45%–6.87% higher than that with filling EPS in the internal cavities for the EPS
filling ratio of 40%–80%.

1. Introduction

Energy and environment are two major challenges faced by the mankind. Building energy consumption accounts for more than
30% of the social energy consumption [1] and becomes the largest terminal part, so building energy conservation has a great
significance on the energy crisis alleviation and the environment protection [2]. Due to the fact that the heat transfer loss in building
envelopes account 60–80% of the building total heat transfer loss [3], it is of vital importance to create the high comfort level and
decrease energy consumption by bettering the thermal performance of the building external envelopes [4,5]. However, for the
common insulation wall with the angle insulation layer, the twice construction of the foundation wall and the insulation layer
installation not only increases the construction cost but also delays the construction time [6,7]. To overcome this twice construction
disadvantages, this study proposes insulation materials are filled into the air cavities of the sintered hollow brick to replace the single
insulation layer.
The sintered hollow brick is always the core wall material in the construction material market of China and the core research of its
thermal performance is concentrated on the layout and heat transfer of air cavities [8–12]. Antar and Baig [8,9] carried out the
conjugate heat transfer analysis to calculate the heat transfer rate. And their results show that increasing the amount of cavities while

⁎
Corresponding author at: Sichuan Agricultural University, No 288, Jianshe Road, Dujiangyan, Sichuan Province, PR China
E-mail address: gynhvac@163.com (Y. Gao).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cscm.2018.02.007
Received 10 October 2017; Received in revised form 5 February 2018; Accepted 6 February 2018
Available online 10 February 2018
2214-5095/ © 2018 The Author. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/BY/4.0/).
C. Hou et al. Case Studies in Construction Materials 8 (2018) 217–225

keeping the block width constant decreases the heat loss significantly and that thermal radiation plays a considerable role in the heat
transfer process of this application. Arendt et al. [13] proposed an optimized hole pattern and studied the effect of hollow ratio on the
thermal parameters of hollow brick. And their consequences presented the optimum hole rate under this hole pattern was 45–65%.
The indexes used in the evaluation were the time lag, the decrement factor, the equivalent thermal diffusivity and the equivalent
thermal conductivity.
Meanwhile, many studies have also attempted to integrate the insulation materials with the cavities of the hollow bricks [14–18].
Hou et al. [15] researched the coupled heat and moisture transfer in hollow concrete block wall filled with compressed straw bricks
experimentally and their research illustrated that filling the compressed straw bricks into hollow concrete block can hinder heat
transfer and improve moisture buffering performance of multilayer wall. And Zukowski and Haese [16] researched the thermal
properties of hollow brick unit filled with perlite insulation and their results showed that heat conductivity of this brick can be equal
to 0.09 W/(m K), which revealed the high insulation property. The similar reseach of Topҫua and Işkdaģ [17] showed the com-
pressive strength decreases and heat conductivity resistance and shrinkage of perlite bricks increase as the replacement ratio of
perlite increases. Al-Hadhrami and Ahmad [18] assessed thermal performance of nine types of clay brick and two types of concrete
brick in use in Saudi Arabia and their results of the measured data showed the addition of insulation material increases the thermal
resistance significantly either within the masonry brick mix to make the brick more lightweight or through filling insulation material
into the holes of masonry bricks.
For the air-conditioning intermittent operation, Xu et al. [19] analyzed the effect of air-conditioning intermittent operation
behaviors on building energy consumption in Hong Kong and their research shows that most respondents were willing to switch off
lighting and small power equipment because they knew the energy saving in doing so, and that up to 11% of annual energy con-
sumption of air-conditioning could be saved for the office. And Budaiwi and Abdou [20] research the HVAC system operational
strategies for the reduced energy consumption in buildings with the intermittent occupancy in mosques and their results show that
annual cooling energy can be reduced by up to 23% through employing the suitable HVAC operation strategy and 30% through the
appropriate operational zoning. Cho and Zaheer-uddin [21] explored a predictive control strategy as a means of improving the energy
efficiency of the intermittently heated radiant floor heating systems. However, research of Kim et al. [22] shows that the simple “on-
off” intermittent control can obtain the higher energy-saving rate. Meanwhile, Fraisse et al. [23–25] analyzed the relationships
among the required the pre-heating time, the thermal comfort level and the energy consumption under the intermittent heating
system, and Hazyuk et al. [26,27] proposed the optimal temperature control of intermittently heated buildings using the model
predictive control.
According to the above problems, the physical models of typical walls were built by the sintered bricks with the different in-
sulation filling ratios and locations. The influence of the insulation filling is numerically researched on temperature and heat flow in
the inner surface of walls with air-conditioning intermittent operation under the Chengdu climate conditions by the Finite Volume
Method.

2. Physical model and governing equations

2.1. Dsecription of physical model

In order to obtain the best filling result of insulation materials in the sintered hollow bricks, the different ratios and locations of
the insulation filling are considered. Fig. 1(a)–(f) shows the schematic diagram of the sintered bricks with the different insulation
filling ratios and locations in this study and the insulation material is considered as expanding polystyrene board (EPS). As showed in
Fig. 1(a)–(f), the EPS filling ratio increases from 0 to 100%, while the insulation filling location moves from internal cavities to
external ones. Meanwhile, to reflect the wall thermal performance improvement due to the filling of EPS in the cavities of bricks, the
typical wall is built by the sintered hollow bricks shown in Fig. 1(a)–(f). Fig. 1(g) shows the wall section built by the sintered hollow
brick. Table 1 shows the thermophysical properties of wall materials referred in this study.

2.2. Thermal boundary conditions

To research the influence of EPS filled in the sintered hollow bricks on the thermal performance of walls under air-conditioning
intermittent operation, air-conditioning runs at 8:00–12:00 and 14:00–18:00 according to the working rules in offices. Fig. 2(a) and
(b) shows the indoor picture and the size of the experimental room. The typical outdoor thermal environment in Chengdu is measured
as shown in Fig. 2(c), while indoor air temperature is measured in the same day under the air-conditioning intermittent operation in
Fig. 2(d). In addition, outside and inside convective heat transfer coefficients are 19W/(m2 K) and 8.7W/(m2 K) respectively, and the
solar radiation absorptivity is 0.457 for outer surface.

2.3. Description of the governing equations

Based on the walls shown in Fig. 1(g), the wall dynamic heat transfer model is considered. Due to the fact that wall heat transfer
can be ignored along the height direction, the building wall is assumed as two-dimensional for the simplicity. Meanwhile, the
assumption has been done in the numerical simulation as following: (1) Air filled in the cavity is Newtonian and incompressible; (2)
The flow is laminar in the cavity; (3) Thermophysical properties are constant except for the density in the buoyancy force;
With the foregoing assumptions, the continuity, momentum, and energy equations for laminar and transient natural convection in

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Fig. 1. The schematic diagram of the sintered bricks with the different EPS filling ratios and locations: (a) Nu 0; (b) Nu 1-1, Nu 1–3 and Nu 1–5; (c) Nu 2–12, Nu 2–13,
Nu 2–15, Nu 2–35 and Nu 2–45; (d) Nu 3–123, Nu 3–345 and Nu 135; (e) Nu 4–1234, Nu 4–2345, and Nu 4–1245; (f) Nu 5–12345; (g) The section of wall built by the
studied hollow brick.

Table 1
Thermophysical properties of materials.

Material name Density (kg/m3) Heat capacity (J/(kg K Thermal conductivity (W/(m K)) Viscosity (Pa s)

Air 1.23 1006.43 0.242 1.789 × 10−5

EPS 22.00 1280.00 0.041 –
Sintered shale 1654.00 750.00 0.440 –
Cement plaster 1860.00 840.00 0.840 –
Foamed concrete 330 1050 0.192 –

the two-dimensional cavity filled with air can be written in the dimensional form as follows:
∂u ∂v
+ =0
∂x ∂y (1)

∂u ∂u ∂u 1 ⎡ ∂p ∂ 2u ∂ 2u
+u +v = − + μair ( 2 + 2 ) ⎤
∂t ∂x ∂y ρ air ⎢
⎣ ∂x ∂ x ∂y ⎥ ⎦ (2)

∂v ∂v ∂v 1 ⎡ ∂p ∂ 2v ∂ 2v
+u +v = − + μair ( 2 + 2 ) + (ρβ )air gΔT ⎤
∂t ∂x ∂y ρair ⎢
⎣ ∂y ∂x ∂y ⎥
⎦ (3)

∂T ∂T ∂T λair ∂ 2T ∂ 2T
+u +v = ( + )
∂t ∂x ∂y ρair CP, air ∂x 2 ∂y 2 (4)
According to the energy conservation law, the dynamic heat transfer of solid is described by the following equation:
∂T ∂ λ ∂T ∂ λ ∂T
= ( s )+ ( s )
∂t ∂x ρs Cp,s ∂x ∂y ρs Cp,s ∂y (5)
The convective heat transfer boundary conditions are adopted on outer and inner surfaces and can be expressed as:
∂T
⎧ λ ∂x = h in (Tl,in − Tin ) x=0
⎨ λ ∂T = hout (Tout − Tl,out ) + αI x=δ
⎩ ∂x (6)
where, T denotes the material temperature, °C; t is the simulation time, s; λair and λs are the thermal conductivities of air and solid,
W/(m K); ρair and ρs denotes the density of air and solid, kg/m3; Cp,air and Cp,s expresses the specific heat of air and solid, J/(kg K); Tin
and Tout are indoor and outdoor air temperatures respectively, °C; Tl,out and Tl,in are outer and inner surface temperatures, °C; I is the

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Fig. 2. (a) The experimental room picture; (b) the experimental room size; (c) variation of outdoor air temperature & solar radiation and (d) variation of indoor air
temperature;.

solar radiation intensity, W/m2; α is the solar radiation absorptivity of outer surface; δ is wall thickness, m;

2.4. Numerical approach of the numerical simulation

The finite volume method is utilized to discretize the equations of the heat transfer model in the simulation region. The con-
vergence of computations is declared at each time instant, when the following criterion is satisfied:
∑ T m+1 − T m
≤ 10−5
∑ Tm (7)
Where, m is the internal iteration number.

2.5. Verification of the numerical simulation

To verify the above heat transfer model, a verification experiment was done. Fig. 3(a) and (b) shows the sections of the ex-
perimental wall and the arrangement scheme of the measurement equipment respectively. In this experiment, T-type thermocouples
with the error lower than 0.30 °C and heat flow meter with the relative error lower than 3% are selected and all measurement data are
recorded by a JTRG-II building thermal temperature automatic tester. Outside and inside convective heat transfer coefficients are
taken as 19W/(m2 K) and 8.7W/(m2 K) respectively. The solar radiation absorptivity is 0.48 for the whitewashed walls. Fig. 3(c)
shows the variation of solar radiation strength, indoor and outdoor air temperature measured by the solarimeter and thermocouples
respectively in Fig. 3(b), while Fig. 3(d) shows the comparison of the experiment and simulation values for both temperature and heat
flow on inner surface. It can be seen clearly that the variations of the simulation and experiment are approximately the same with a
maximum difference of less than 2%, which demonstrates that the heat transfer model is effective and accurate, and also indicates
that the predicted conclusions are verified by the means of this mathematical model.

3. Results of numerical simulation

To study the thermal performance improvement of sintered hollow bricks by the EPS filling under the air-conditioning inter-
mittent operation, temperatures and heat flow in the inner surface were monitored as the main analysis objects by the numerical
simulation, which has been verified by the above experiment. In the numerical simulation, inner and outer thermal boundaries were
presented in Fig. 2(c) and (d) with the consideration of the ratios and locations of the EPS filling in Fig. 1(a)–(f).

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Fig. 3. (a) Experiment wall; (b) the arrangement scheme of measurement equipment; (c) Variation of solar radiation strength, indoor and outdoor air temperature and
(d) Comparison of the experiment and simulation values for inner surface temperature and heat flow.

3.1. Comparison of inner surface temperatures

Fig. 4 shows the variation of inner surface temperatures with time for walls built by the different sintered hollow bricks and the
EPS filling ratios and locations of the mark number has been shown in Fig. 1(a). It can be clearly seen that it can be clearly seen that
inner surface temperatures have some differences under the different EPS filling ratios and locations, especially for the operation time
of 14:00–18:00 when the original temperature of wall is much higher than the design temperature of air-conditioning. As shown in
the figure, inner surface temperature reduces the fastest for the bricks with the EPS filled into the internal cavities under the EPS
filling ratio of 20% in Fig. 4(b), while it reduces the fastest for the bricks with the EPS filled into the internal and external cavities
simultaneously under the EPS filling ratios of 40%–80% in Fig. 4(c)–(e). It is resulted from that the insulation in the internal cavities
can improve the thermal response rate of inner surface temperature due to its high thermal insulation properties and low thermal
inertia. In addition, filling EPS in the external cavities can resist the thermal penetration of outdoor thermal fluctuation, so filling EPS
into the internal and external cavities simultaneously can obtain the best filling result. Meanwhile, it can be found that inner surface
temperature lowers with the increase of the EPS filling ratio under the air-conditioning operation period, especially under the period
of 14:00–18:00.

3.2. Comparison of inner surface heat flows

Fig. 5 shows the variation of inner surface heat flows with time for walls built by the different hollow bricks. It can be clearly seen
that the variation curve of inner surface heat flow is the highest for the bricks with EPS filled into the internal cavities under the EPS
filling ratio of 20% in Fig. 5(b), while it is the highest for the bricks with EPS filled into the internal and external cavities si-
multaneously under the EPS filling ratio of 40%–80% in Fig. 5(c)–(e). And due to the fact that the heat flow is negative, the high curve
of inner surface heat flow stands for the low heat flow values. Therefore, filling EPS in the internal cavities or both internal and

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Fig. 4. Variation of inner surface temperature with time under the sintered shale hollow bricks with the different EPS filling ratio of (a) 0%, (b) 20%, (c) 40%, (d) 60%,
(e) 80% and (f) 100%.

external cavities simultaneously is beneficial to building energy efficiency. Meanwhile, it can be found the values of inner surface
heat flow are reduced obviously with increasing of EPS filling ratio under the air-conditioning operation period, especially under the
period of 14:00–18:00.
To further analyze the effect of EPS filling ratio on the inner surface heat flow, the decrement rate of inner surface heat flow is
proposed on the basis of no EPS filling and its equation can be described as following:

HFAVG (η) − HFAVG (η = 0%)

DR (η) = × 100%
HFAVG (η = 0%) (8)

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Fig. 5. Variation of inner surface heat flow with time under the sintered shale hollow brick with the different EPS filling ratio of (a) 0%, (b) 20%, (c) 40%, (d) 60%, (e)
80% and (f) 100%.

Where, DR is the decrement rate of inner surface heat flow, %; η is the EPS filling ratio, %; HFAVG donates the average value of inner
surface heat flow during the air-conditioning operation period, w/m2;
Fig. 6 shows the variation of the decrement rate of inner surface heat flow with the different ratios and location of EPS filling. It
can be clearly seen that with the increasing of EPS filling ratio (or the decreasing of air filling ratio), the decrement rate of inner
surface heat flow is increased obviously. The average decrement rates of inner surface heat flow are 18.41% for EPS filling ratio of
20%, 28.63% for EPS filling ratio of 40%, 34.19% for EPS filling ratio of 60%, 37.66% for EPS filling ratio of 80% and 39.15% for EPS
filling ratio of 100%, which shows the EPS filling ratio increase has the higher sensitivity on inner surface heat flow under the low
insulation filling ratio. In addition, filling EPS in the external cavities is optimum with the decrement rate 5.92% higher than filling

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Fig. 6. Variation of the decrement rate of inner surface heat flow with air and EPS filling ratios under the air-conditioning intermittent operation.

EPS in the internal cavities for filling EPS ratio of 20%, while filling EPS in internal and external cavities simultaneously is optimum
with decrement rate 2.45%–6.87% higher than that with filling EPS in the internal cavities for filling EPS ratio of 40%–80%.
Meanwhile, the regression equation for the average decrement rates of inner surface heat flow with EPS filling ratio is obtained,
which can directly show the variation rules of inner surface heat flow with EPS filling ratio. And with the increase of EPS filling ratio,
the slope of the regression curve reduces gradually, which show that increasing EPS filling ratio has the better result in reducing inner
surface heat flow under the low filling ratio.

4. Conclusions

In this study, the influence of the insulation filling is numerically researched on temperature and heat flow in the inner surface of
walls with air-conditioning intermittent operation under the Chengdu climate conditions by the Finite Volume Method. The following
conclusions have been obtained:

(1) Filling the insulation materials in the air cavities is beneficial to improve thermal performance of the sintered hollow bricks, and
the larger the EPS filling ratio, the higher the thermal performance improvement.
(2) The increase of the filling ratio has the higher sensitivity on inner surface heat flows under the low insulation filling ratio. The
decrement rates of inner surface heat flows are increased by 34.19% with the increase of the EPS filling ratio from 0 to 60%, while
it only increases 4.95% with the increase of insulation filling ratio from 60% to 100%
(3) In the view of inner surface temperatures, filling EPS in internal air cavities of sintered hollow brick has the optimum effect, while
filling EPS in external air cavities has the least effect.
(4) In the view of inner surface heat flow, filling EPS in the external cavities is optimum with the decrement rate 5.92% higher than
filling EPS in internal cavities for the EPS filling ratio of 20%, while filling EPS in internal and external cavities simultaneously is
optimum with decrement rate 2.45%–6.87% higher than that with filling EPS in the internal cavities for the EPS filling ratio of
40%–80%.

Conflict of interest statement

We declare that we have no financial and personal relationships with other people or organizations that can inappropriately
influence our work. And there is no professional or other personal interest of any nature or kind in any product, service and/or
company that could be construed as influencing the position presented in, or the review of, the manuscript entitled,

Acknowledgement

The authors gratefully acknowledge the financial support from Key Laboratory of Development and Application of Rural
Renewable Energy, Misistry of Agriculture, China (2017005)

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