Experiments on thermal contact conductance between metals below 100 K

Abstract

The thermal contact conductance is one of the important components in heat transfer mechanism. The accurate estimation of thermal contact conductance is necessary for the development of a conduction-cooled superconducting magnet system because the metallic materials are thermally connected to the refrigerator or heat sink to cool the superconducting magnet without cryogen. The contact resistance occurs at the interface between metals and the amount of conductance can be affected by various factors, such as surface roughness, contact area, and contact pressure. In the superconducting magnet system, there are several metal components in contact with each other for cooling magnet as well as supplying current to the magnet. Therefore, a temperature gradient exists between superconducting magnet and cryocooler. In this study, we have developed the thermal contact conductance measurement system and used the steady state method to measure the thermal conductance between metals. The effects of temperature, contact pressure and interfacial materials on the thermal contact conductance are also discussed.