| dc.description.abstract | The purpose of this work was to design, build, and validate an experimental room for the study of building interior convective heat transfer. The full-scale room with interior dimensions 16'x12'x1 0', was constructed with 18" walls and 15" floor and ceiling. The facility was elevated 5' above the lab floor and the walls were heavily insulated. All six surfaces were divided into 2'x4' cells with a unique modular heated panel system mounted on the inside of the cells. ASHRAE Standard 51 was employed for volumetric air flow measurement. A water source heat pump provided chilled water to a fan-coil unit which in tum provided conditioned air to the room. A total of seventeen validation tests were performed focusing on volumetric air flow measurement and an overall room heat balance. Analysis was directed at results from a subset of seven experiments ranging from 5-25 ach. Additionally, an uncertainty analysis was performed for all experiments. For the lower volumetric experiments (<10 ach), initial room heat balance results, coupled with the uncertainty results, fell short of good agreement. Further analysis isolated uncertainty sources at the room inlet temperature measurement, radiative communication with room inlet temperature measurement, room conduction backlosses and room transient effects. Recommendations are given to alleviate these uncertainties. Suggestions for future work and research, that the experimental facility could support, are given. The room, while operational, will require further testing, modification and evaluation to be considered a viable building interior convective heat transfer investigative facility. | |
