Thermal Analysis of a Microhotplate - An Experimental Study

Abstract

In the present work, experimental and numerical thermal analysis of a microhotplate were performed to evaluate the heat transfer mechanism at small Rayleigh number ( $Ra$ ). The convective and radiative heat transfer coefficient values were evaluated for microhotplate mounted over two different mounting positions (namely model-1 & model-2). At different heat generation ( $Q$ ) values, it was found that the average convective coefficient value was less than $10\frac {W}{m^{2}K}$ , irrespective of the microhotplate mounting position. Comparison of both models at a similar $Q$ ( $\simeq 0.69W$ ) value, reveals that the radiative heat transfer contribution was 33% & 68% for model-1 and model-2 respectively. Based on the results obtained in the present study, a correlation was developed using regression analysis for the convective Nusselt number in terms of Rayleigh number ( $8.84\times 10^{-4}\le \:Ra\:\le 4.94\times 10^{-3}$ ), and the convective Nusselt number obtained from the correlation and present study are within ±17%.