METU, Department of Aerospace Engineering

AEE 331 Heat Transfer HW 1

Due 19 Nov. 2018 to Course Assistants : Zeynep Ünal / Özcan YIRTICI

(1 -to be submitted) A computer chip has a square, flat surface with an area of 50 cm2 consuming an
electrical power of 55 W. The chip is burried in a board that has negligible conductivity, so the back and
side surfaces may be assumed insulted. The chip safe operating temperature is below 85o C. There is an
airflow available at 25o C that provides a convection coefficient of 40 W/m2 K at all parts of any exposed
surface. Assume the chip has a small volume, that is the dimension between the back and exposed surfaces
is small, so the chip may be assumed isothermal.
a) Calculate the steady state surface temperature of the chip, if no pin fins (extended surfaces) are
used. Is the chip operation safe?
b) One way of increasing heat removal from the chip is to use pin fins as shown in the figure. If we
have an option of using multiples of such pins with a conductivity of 25 W/mK, a diameter of 4 mm, and
maximum length of 3 cm due to space limitation, calculate the minumum number of pins for safe operation.
Assume attachment of pin fins does not cause temperature variations in the chip.

(2 - to be submitted) Water flow through a pipe (A) of 10-cm inner radius is heated by a sandwiched
heater as shown in the figure. The heater is initially protected by an outer wall (B) that has a relatively
low conductivity acting also as some insulator. However, this material is later determined to providing
insufficient insulation, and hence an additional insulation is applied (C). The heater inner and outer radii
are 21 cm and 21.5 cm, respectively. The inner and outer radii of the outermost wall are 30 cm and
35 cm, respectively. The pipe wall A has a conductivity of 25 W/mK, the initial protection material B
has a conductivity of 5 W/mK, and the second material C has a conductivity of 0.25 W/mK. The entire
pipe system is subject to airflow at 5o C providing a convection coefficient of 35 W/m2 K. The water flow
through the pipe at a given cross-section has a mean temperature of 65o C with a convection coefficient of
145 W/m2 K.
a) Sketch the thermal circuit with all relevant heat modes and resistances shown.
b) Inner and outer radii of the sandwiched heating material are close to each other, and hence show
that it may be assumed nearly isothermal.
c) When the heater is not operating, calculate the heat loss on per unit length basis for the cross-section
at which water mean temperature is given.
d) Calculate the ratio of the heat transfer rates to the water and outer airflow.
e) Calculate the temperature of the heater when it is running at 2.5 kW/m.

prob.1 prob.2