Experimental validation of CFD model of thermal fluxes through a multilayer wall

Abstract

The evaluation of thermal losses through building envelope is complex due to the presence of different components such as geometrical and structural thermal bridges, multilayer walls, windows and shadow areas. In particular, in presence of material and/or shape discontinuities, the heat flux becomes two-dimensional or three-dimensional and loses its one-dimensionality. Thermal bridges are weak points of the building envelope; the measurement of heat losses through the walls is quite complicated and in particular the detection of bi-tridimensional thermal flux. The integration between the cfd analysis and the experimental study aims the improvement of the measurement technique and the assessment of the dispersion of heat fluxes through multi-layer walls both in the steady and unsteady measurement conditions. The numerical study has been directed for modelling, by means of the commercial numerical code Fluent, of the experimental test section consisting of a multi-layer wall, in which a structural thermal bridge has been inserted in order to make accurate measurements of the three-dimensional heat flux in steady state condition. The study has been developed to validate the CFD model by the experimental set-up, with the aim to investigate possible measurement methodologies of heat fluxes.