AN IMPROVEMENT IN THE DETERMINATION OF THERMAL-PROPERTIES OF ELASTOMERIC COMPOUNDS

Using the idea of Hands and Horsfall for measuring thermal diffusivity of rubber, an improved equipment was developed based on a data acquis ition system with an enhancement in the temperature estimation. The no n-linear heat equation was resolved by means of finite differences and the thermal conductivity of a rubber compound and its dependence with temperature was obtained. An agreement was achieved between experimen tal and numerical data when the temperature vs. time curve of the samp le is recalculated using the estimated conductivity.