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Session 3648

Development of a Heat Transfer Module for Design Courses

John C. Anderson, Heather L. Cooper Purdue University

Abstract Due to time constraints and the lack of available educational materials, students in engineering and engineering technology often do not get an opportunity to work actual design problems in heat transfer. This is especially true for those students taking concentrations in machine design and manufacturing. Upon graduation they are frequently faced with heat transfer issues, where they must find usable data and make educated decisions.

Capstone or design project courses frequently offer an opportunity to expose the student to applied heat transfer design problems. This paper describes the development and testing of a module that may be plugged into a design or project course to expose students to practical heat transfer design. Module elements include a review of heat transfer modes and mathematical models, as well as lecture and lab elements targeted toward problems frequently encountered in manufacturing processes.

Introduction Most introductory courses in heat transfer have similar formats that provide an introduction to the basic theory of the various modes of heat transfer. Some courses even include supporting laboratory experiments that demonstrate and reinforce one or more of the basic concepts. However, in the authors’ experience, the typical undergraduate engineering or engineering technology curriculum does not include an advanced or applied heat transfer course, and design project or capstone courses are often aimed at other disciplines such as manufacturing or machine design. Therefore, many students never have an opportunity to apply the basic heat transfer principles learned in introductory courses to more complex, realistic design problems. A search of recent developments in heat transfer education produced studies dealing with very specific areas such as improved heat transfer experiments, software- or web-based materials, and team-based learning, but no prior work was found using a comprehensive design-focused approach1-5.

To address this need, an applications-oriented heat transfer instructional module was developed for use in design project or capstone courses. The module includes both a review of basic heat transfer concepts and an introduction to their applications in design-type situations. The module described in this paper specifically targets a senior design course in plastics manufacturing in a mechanical engineering technology curriculum, but the basic structure is such that it can be easily adapted for other capstone courses. The following discussion presents the development of the module itself as well as results from its recent implementation in the classroom.

Module Development Development of the instructional module began with reviewing the material currently covered in the required introductory thermal science course in the Mechanical Engineering Technology (MET) curriculum at Purdue University, as well as in other introductory heat transfer texts6. In

Proceedings of the 2003 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright © 2003, American Society for Engineering Education

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Anderson, J., & Cooper, H. (2003, June), Development Of A Heat Transfer Module For Design Courses Paper presented at 2003 Annual Conference, Nashville, Tennessee. 10.18260/1-2--12633