Heat transfer principles in

engineering

Introduction

“… It’s very cold today!!” “And windy too !!” or

“… I like cold beer, put it in the freezer for a while
so that it cools down three or four degrees …” or
“… Our production process needs the mixture to
warm up to X°C in 45 minutes and to be kept at
that temperature for 1 hour… “

We have all heard and said expressions like these

many times. They are part of our daily and
professional lives. All of them have concepts such
as heat, temperature and degrees in common, which
we consider to be well known but about which we
can occasionally be confused.

Let’s try to clear them up! And, what is more

important, check how their application can answer
and resolve the previous expressions.

Heat and temperature

Heat and temperature are different concepts,

although related. Heat is the total energy of
molecular motion in a substance, while temperature
is a measure of its average molecular energy.

Heat depends on the speed of the particles, their

number, size and type. Temperature does not
depend on the size, number or type.

For example, the temperature of a small glass of

hot water will be higher than the temperature of an
ocean, but the ocean has more heat because it has
more water – more particles – and therefore more
total thermal energy.

There are also differences in the types of study of

the processes that need to be developed. Beginning
with the sciences involved:

The transfer of energy – heat – always goes from

the higher temperature medium (with a higher
measurement) to the lower temperature, and stops
when the two media have the same temperature and
reach therefore a state of thermal equilibrium.

Thermodynamics is the science that deals with the

amount of heat transfer from one initial equilibrium
state to another, and makes no reference or
indication to the duration of the process.

A thermodynamic analysis simply tells us how

much heat must be transferred to make a change
from a specific state of equilibrium to another, to
satisfy the principle of conservation of energy.

Although it establishes the necessary basic

parameters and a framework for action, in practice
it is not enough.

It tells us how much heat to dissipate to cool our

beer to get the temperature we want, but does not
give us any guidance on the time to do so and, of
course, in our production process problem, we
cannot establish any solution.

Heat transfer

What we are really interested in is the rate of heat

transfer. The determination of the heat transfer
rates to or from a system and, therefore, the heating
or cooling times and temperature variation is the
subject of the science of heat transfer.

Heat transfer helps us resolve the issues raised at

the beginning of this text and plays a decisive role
in the design of virtually all the equipment and
devices that surround us: our computers and
televisions must consider heat transfer rates so they
cool and do not overheat, affecting their operation;
appliances such as cookers, dryers and fridges have
to ensure the heating and cooling properties for
which they will be sold.

When building our homes, a heat transfer study is

carried out, based on which the thickness of the
thermal insulation or the heating system is
determined.

In the industrial sector, equipment such as heat

exchangers, boilers, furnaces, condensers, batteries,
heaters, fridges and solar panels are mainly
designed on the basis of heat transfer analysis.

More sophisticated equipment such as cars and

planes require these studies to prevent engines or
cabins from overheating.

Heat transfer processes not only increase, decrease

or maintain the temperatures of the affected bodies,
they can also produce phase changes, such as
melting ice or boiling water.

In engineering, heat transfer processes are often

designed to take advantage of these phenomena.
Space capsules that return to the Earth’s
atmosphere at very high speeds are equipped with a
thermal shield which is melted in a controlled
manner in a process called ablation to prevent
overheating inside the capsule.

Most of the heat produced by friction with the

atmosphere is used to melt the heat shield and not
to increase the temperature of the capsule.

The transfer of heat is therefore the process by

which energy is exchanged in the form of heat
between different bodies, or between different parts
of the same body at different temperatures. This
heat can be transferred in three ways: by
conduction, convection or radiation. Although
these three transfer methods take place many times
simultaneously, usually one of the mechanisms
predominates over the other two.

Conduction

Conduction is the transfer of heat by direct contact

between bodies or through the same body. In
conduction, there is no transfer of matter, only
energy.

Molecules vibrate or move with greater speed in a

region at a higher temperature. When interacting
with neighbouring molecules of a lower
temperature, they transfer part of their energy,
whether within the same body or from another
body in contact with the first.

In 1822, the French mathematician Joseph Fourier

formulated a precise mathematical expression
known today as Fourier’s law of heat conduction.

This law states that the conduction rate or heat

transfer through a body per unit cross section is
proportional to the temperature gradient that exists
in the body:

The proportionality factor, k, is the thermal

conductivity of the material and indicates the
amount of heat transferred per unit time,
temperature and length. A is an area that can
change if it depends on the distance (dx), so an
appropriate average (Am) should be used.

For a constant normal section, e.g. the walls of a

building, Am = A.

Materials such as gold, silver or copper have high

thermal conductivities and conduct heat well, while
materials such as glass or wood have smaller
conductivities and conduct heat very badly.

Therefore, to answer the questions posed at the

start of this text, the materials involved, their
thermal conductivity and dimensions in the
temperatures of the process need to be known well,
as the conduction heat transfer takes place through
them.

Thus, analysing how to cool our beer from a totally

scientific point, we need to know the properties of
the aluminium alloy of the can and its thickness, as
the beer transfers heat to the can via conduction.

Convection

Convection transfers heat via the interchange of

hot and cold molecules. It occurs when a surface at
a certain temperature is in contact with a fluid
moving at a different temperature.

It was Newton’s Law of Cooling which indicated

the form of the transfer via the equation; thus
defining the heat transmitted from the surface of a
solid to a fluid in motion:

where

Ts is the body (solid) surface temperature.

T is the fluid temperature.
h is the coefficient of heat transfer by
convection.
A surface in contact with the fluid

Two main types can be considered depending on

the source of the fluid motion:

Natural convection, in which the fluid

motion is entirely because of differences in
the density of the fluid temperature due to the
variation between two points.

Forced convection where the fluid

movement is due to some external factor. The
transfer of heat is better with forced
convection, since the movement – the speed –
is much higher, as there is support for that
external factor (e.g. pump, fan, wind or
stirrer) in addition to the density difference.

The temperature of our body is 36.5°C and the

surrounding air is generally lower, so that a certain
amount of heat is constantly being transferred from
our body to the ambient air.

When the transfer occurs quickly, because the two

temperatures are quite different, we feel cold. This
energy transmitted from our body to the ambient air
is by natural convection.

And obviously, if it is very windy, there is more

transfer and a greater feeling of cold, since the
convection is forced.

The coefficient of heat transfer by convection, h in

formula (2), depends mainly on the physical and
thermodynamic properties of the fluid (e.g. density,
specific heat capacity and viscosity) at its
temperature when the heat transfer is evaluated as
well as its speed at that time.

To resolve our questions, whether routine or

professional, both the fluid properties in our
processes as well as their state or speed in that
process need to be known.

Radiation

Radiation is heat transfer via electromagnetic

waves. It could be termed as molecular transport, as
energy is produced by changes in the electronic
configurations of constituent molecules or atoms
and transported by electromagnetic waves or
photons.

There is no direct contact between the two media

and the intermediary or interface does not
participate in the exchange functions; in most cases
this is air, although there is also heat transfer in a
vacuum.

The heat received by the Earth from the Sun is

transmitted by radiation through empty space. The
heat felt in front of a campfire is also from
radiation.

In 1900, the German physicist Max Planck used the

quantum theory and the mathematical formalism of
statistical mechanics to formulate the fundamental
law of radiation.

The mathematical expression of this law relates the

intensity of the radiant energy emitted by a body at
a certain wavelength with the temperature of the
body.

For each temperature and each wavelength there is

a maximum radiant energy. Only an ideal body – a
black body – emits radiation exactly according to
Planck’s law. Real bodies emit at a slightly lower
intensity.

The contribution of all wavelengths to the radiant

energy emitted is called the body’s emitting power,
and corresponds to the amount of energy emitted
per unit area of the body and unit time.

From Planck’s law, two Austrian physicists, Joseph

Stefan and Ludwig Boltzmann, discovered in 1879
and 1884, respectively, that the emitting power of a
surface is proportional to the fourth power of its
absolute temperature.

This proportionality factor is called the Stefan-

Boltzmann constant in their honour:

where

Ts, is the temperature of the body surface

ε, is the coefficient of emissivity, which is
property of the material related to its thermal
radiation capacity with that of the ideal black
body.
σ, is the Stefan-Boltzmann constant, = 5.67 x
10-8 W/m2 K4
A, is the emission surface

If we consider that all substances emit radiant

energy only by having a temperature above
absolute zero, the formula (3) becomes

Where F1-2 is a module that weights the geometric

relationship of the two bodies and their emissivity
coefficients.

In the production process referred to at the

beginning of this text, we have described all the
heat transfer processes involved.

The heat is mainly transmitted by convection in the

exchangers, reactors and batteries of the facilities
between the heat transfer fluids (thermal fluid,
steam and hot water) and the fluids contained in the
equipment.

The heat is produced from the fuel in a boiler with

the transfer mainly by radiation in its combustion
chamber and by convection in the coils or smoke
pipes.

Finally, in the calculation to avoid losses through

the pipes or equipment, the properties and thickness
of the thermal insulation must be considered, as the
heat transfer between the metal wall of the tubes or
exchangers and our insulation is via conduction.

So far a quick overview of heat transfer processes.

The large number of applications and their
complexity and diversity mean that the four
formulas mentioned in this document are derived in
their hundreds, to be able to consider each
particularity and allow for each specific application
to have specific and appropriate design criteria.

The document Heat Transfer Form includes the

most important.