THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY OF PINE WOOD DUST FILLED EPOXY COMPOSITES

Abstract

Guarded heat flow meter test method is used to measure the thermal conductivity of pine wood dust filled epoxy composites using an instrument UnithermTM Model 2022 in accordance with ASTM-E1530. In the numerical study, the finite-element package ANSYS is used to calculate the conductivity of the composites. Three-dimensional spheres-in-cube lattice array models are used to simulate the microstructure of composite materials for various filler concentrations ranging from about 6 to 36 vol%. This study reveals that the incorporation of pine wood dust results in reduction of conductivity of epoxy resin and thereby improves its thermal insulation capability. With addition of 6.5 vol% of filler, the thermal conductivity of epoxy is found to decrease by about 19.8% and with about 36 vol% of filler addition, a 57.3% reduction in thermal conductivity of neat epoxy is achieved. The experimentally measured conductivity values are compared with the numerically calculated ones and also with the already existing theoretical and empirical models. It is found that the values obtained for various composite models using finite element method (FEM) are in reasonable agreement with the experimental values.