Heat transfer through partitioned enclosures

A closed-form model for the computation of heat transfer rates through the rectangular-partitioned enclosures is investigated. The rectangular-partitioned enclosures may contain solid or gas with or without a constant and uniformly distributed heat generation. The conduction in the enclosures is considered as two-dimensional, whereas one-dimensional heat transfer through the fin-type partition is assumed. Dimensionless heat flux plots are parametrically studied by varying the aspect ratio (L/H) of the enclosure, the ratio of thermal conductivities of the enclosure to the fin-type partition (k _a /k _f ), the Biot number (β _a =h _a L/k _a ), and the reduced partition thickness (t ^*/L). It is demonstrated through an example problem that there is a large error in using one-dimensional analysis, particularly at lower values of k _a /k _f , and β _a .