MEL301 Heat and Mass Transfer

1st Semester 2015-16

I.I.T - Ropar

Tutorial Sheet #2
(This is a draft version. Some more questions may be added but none will be removed, so you may start
solving these one-by-one)
General Instructions:
1. Deadline to submit this assignment: To be announced
2. Study and revise Chapter 1 and Chapter-2 (Heat Conduction Equation) from the textbook.
3. The thermal properties of various materials can be obtained from the several tables given in the Appendix of
the textbook
4. While solving problems in this course draw the system/control volume boundary and follow rest of the
procedure mentioned in the class (identification of problem, governing equations, assumptions etc.), where
applicable.
PRACTISE PROBLEMS (These problems are for practice, no need to submit them however each
student must solve ALL these problems themselves)
1) Read and analyze all the solved examples of these chapter(s) (chapter 1 and 2)
2) A wall made of brick has a thickness of 20cm. If one side of the wall is maintained at 40oC, and the
other at 25oC:
a. calculate the heat flux (in W/m2) across this wall,
b. calculate the rate of heat transfer (in Watts) taking place across this wall, assuming it to be 4m
wide and 3m high,
c. calculate the energy crossing across the wall (in Joules as well as kWhr) during a period of
8hours,
d. calculate the cost of maintaining the room at the desired temperature (assuming the cost of
each unit of energy, kWhr, to be about 2 Rupees).
3) Repeat problem#2 by assuming the wall to be made of glass (2cm thick)
4) A wall made of brick has a thickness of 20cm. If one side of the wall (interior) is maintained at 25 oC,
and the other side (exterior) at 10oC. If the outside air temperature is 5oC, calculate the convection heat
transfer coefficient as well as the heat flux (in W/m2) crossing the wall.

5) Consider a medium in which the heat conduction equation is given in its simplest form as :
2

T
x

(a)
(b)
(c)
(d)

1 T

Is heat transfer steady or transient?

Is heat transfer one-, two-, or three-dimensional?
Is there heat generation in the medium?
Is the thermal conductivity of the medium constant or variable?
1

Provide brief justification for your answer.

6) Does the heat flux vector at a point P on the isothermal surface of a medium have to be perpendicular
to the surface at that point? Explain.
7) Heat is generated in a long wire of radius ro at a constant rate of

e gen

per unit volume. The wire is

covered with a plastic insulation layer. Express the heat flux boundary condition at the interface in
terms of the heat generated.
8) Consider a large 3-cm-thick stainless steel plate in which heat is generated uniformly at the rate of 5
106 W/m3. Assuming the plate is losing heat from both sides, determine the heat flux on the surface of
the plate during steady state operation.

9) Steady 1-D heat conduction take place in a long slat of with W (in the direction of heat flow, x) and
thickness Z. the slabs thermal conductivity varies with temperature as k = k*/(T* + T), where T is the
temperature (in K), and k* (in W/m) and T* (in K) are two constants. The temperature at x = 0 and x =
W are T0 and TW respectively. Show that the heat flux in steady operation is given by
q

T T0
ln *

W
T TW

k *

Also, calculate the heat flux for T* = 1000 K, T0 = 600 K, TW = 400 K, k* = 7 104 W/m, and
W=20cm.

PROBLEMS (These must be submitted)

1) A cold storage consists of a cubical chamber of dimension 2m x 2m x 2m, maintained at 10C
inside temperature. The outside wall temperature is 35C. The top and side walls are covered by a
low conducting insulation with thermal conductivity k = 0.06 W/mK. There is no heat loss from the
bottom. If heat loss through the top and side walls is to be restricted to 500W, What is the minimum
thickness of insulation required?

2) A square silicon chip is of width W=5mm on a side and of thickness t=1mm. The chip is mounted
in a substrate such that there is no heat loss from its side and back surfaces. The top surface
is exposed to a coolant. The thermal conductivity of the chip is 200W/mK. If 5W are being
dissipated by the chip, what is the temperature difference between its back and front surfaces?

3) Air flows over a rectangular plate having dimensions 0.5 m x 0.25 m. The free stream temperature
of the air is 300C. At steady state, the plate temperature is 40oC. If the convective heat transfer
coefficient is 250 W/m2 .K, determine the heat transfer rate from the air to one side of the plate.

4) A sphere of diameter 10 mm and emissivity 0.9 is maintained at 80C inside an oven with a
wall temperature of 400C. What is the net transfer rate from the oven walls to the object?

5) A solid aluminum sphere of emissivity e, initially at a high temperature, is cooled by convection

and radiation in a chamber having walls at a lower temperature. Convective cooling is achieved with
a gas passing through the chamber. Write a differential equation to predict the variation of sphere
temperature with time during the cooling process.

6) The steady-state temperature distribution in a onedimensional slab of thermal conductivity 50W/m.K

and thickness 50 mm is found to be T = a + bx2 , where a = 2000oC, b = -20000 oC/m2 , T is in degrees
Celsius and x in meters.
(a) What is the heat generation rate in the slab?
(b) Determine the heat fluxes at the two wall faces. From the given temperature distribution and the
heat fluxes obtained, can you comment on the heat generation rate?

7) Consider 1-D heat transfer across a slab with thermal conductivity k and thickness L. The steady state
temperature is of the form T = Ax3 +Bx2 + Cx + D. Find expressions for the heat generation rate per
unit volume in the slab and heat fluxes at the two wall faces (i.e. x = 0, L).

8) Consider a medium in which the heat conduction equation is given in its simplest form as :
1
T
T
kr

k
0
r r
r
z z

(e) Is heat transfer steady or transient?

(f) Is heat transfer one-, two-, or three-dimensional?
(g) Is there heat generation in the medium?
(h) Is the thermal conductivity of the medium constant or variable?
Provide brief justification for your answer.

9) In a solar pond, the absorption of solar energy can be modeled as heat generation and can be
approximated by e gen e 0 e

bx

, where e 0 is the rate absorption at the top surface per unit volume and

b is a constant. Obtain a relation for the total heat generation in a water layer of surface area A and
thickness L at the top of the pond.

Review questions (optional): These questions are inspired by application of heat transfer in everyday life and
their purpose is to just encourage the students to think about such day-to-day applications. Therefore these are
not compulsory to be submitted as regular tutorial problems.
Review question#1: On what principle does a Liquid mosquito vaporizer work? Are there some heat transfer
and/or mass transport phenomenon at work? Explain very briefly. What are the reasons for having these slots
(shown below)?
Can you think of some appropriate boundary and/or initial conditions which may be applied in order to
analyze this device thermally?

Slots