A simple setup to test thermal contact resistance between interfaces of two contacted solid materials

An experimental setup to measure the thermal contact conductance across solid/solid interface is described in this paper. This setup was built at room temperature, it does not need vacuum environment and can be used in normal pressure environment. An experimental investigation of thermal contact resistance of two brass columns was conducted under different conditions, which were classified as four major aspects, including the interfacial pressure, the voltage of heater, environmental temperature compensation and thermal conductive adhesive. The effects of these four conditions on the thermal contact resistance were investigated and the results show that thermal contact resistance decreases with the increase of interfacial pressure, thermal contact resistance almost does not change with the increase of input voltage of heater, and the thermal contact resistance for the experiments with temperature compensation is lower than that without temperature compensation. Moreover, the thermal contact resistance measured by experiment with thermal conductive adhesive at the interface is lower than that the one without thermal conductive adhesive. Analyses of the experimental results were presented and explanations to the effects were given after the analyses.