Comparison of thermal performance of different wall structures

Abstract

Paper presented at the 9th International Conference on Heat Transfer, Fluid Mechanics and Thermodynamics, Malta, 16-18 July, 2012.

This study deals with comparison of thermal performance of six different wall structures for a south-facing wall. Numerical model based on an implicit finite difference method under steady periodic conditions is used to determine of heat transmission loads of multilayer walls. For this purpose, the outside surface of the wall is exposed to periodic solar radiation and outdoor environmental temperature. The inside surface is exposed to room air maintained at constant indoor design temperature. Building walls made of brick, concrete and ytong are performed for uninsulated and insulated wall structures. The investigation is carried out for July 21 and January 21 chosen to represent typical summer and winter conditions in İzmir, Turkey. Expanded polystyrene (EPS) as insulation material is selected. It is seen that the maximum temperature swings in both summer and winter occur for the wall made with concrete while minimum temperature swings occur for ytong wall. Besides, insulated wall significantly reduces peak load and load fluctuations at inside surface, compared with uninsulated wall. Results show that time lag of ytong wall without insulation is obtained as 12.95 h while time lags of brick and concrete walls with 10 cm EPS insulation are obtained as 8.35 h and 7.47 h, respectively. Results also show that peak load of ytong wall without insulation is equal peak load when brick and concrete walls are insulated with EPS at 4.25 cm and 4.75 cm thicknesses, respectively.