The heat flux through a wood slab 50 mm thick, whose inner and outer surface temperatures are 40 and 20°C, respectively, has been determined to be 40 W/m2. What is the thermal conductivity of the wood?

Answer :

Answer:

[tex] k = - \frac{40 W/m^2}{\frac{20-40 C}{0.05 m}}= 0.1 \frac{W}{m C}[/tex]

Step-by-step explanation:

Previous concepts

The Fourier's law, states that the "rate of heat transfer through a material is proportional to the negative gradient in the temperature and to the area, at right angles to that gradient, through which the heat flows".

And we have the following formula given:

[tex] q_x = -k A \frac{dT}{dx}[/tex]

For this case we have the following data given:

[tex] L= 50 mm * \frac{1m}{1000 mm}=0.05m[/tex]

[tex] T_i = 40 C[/tex] represent the inner surface temperature

[tex] T_o = 20 C[/tex] represent the outer surface temperature

[tex] \frac{q_x}{A} = 40 W/m^2 [/tex] represent the heat flux

So then we are interested on the value of k.

Solution to the problem

if we solve for the value of k from the formula:

[tex] q_x = -k A \frac{dT}{dx}[/tex]

We got:

[tex] k = - \frac{q_x}{A \frac{dT}{dx}}[/tex]

We can rewrite this expression like this:

[tex] k = - \frac{q_x}{A \frac{T_o -T_i}{L}}[/tex]

And if we replace the values given we got:

[tex] k = - \frac{40 W/m^2}{\frac{20-40 C}{0.05 m}}= 0.1 \frac{W}{m C}[/tex]

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