Non-stationary thermal behavior of reinforced composites - A better evaluation of wall energy balance for convective conditions

The paper deals with the incoming heat flux and wall temperature evaluations for laminated composites subjected to a convective heat flux. Two unidimensional models are considered: the quasi-stationary model (QSM) and the uncoupled component model (UCM). It is shown that the UCM model is valid for a cold wall and the QSM model is valid for a quasi-adiabatic wall, while for intermediate wall temperatures both models lead to unacceptable errors. A linear approximation is proposed which allows to significantly reduce the errors while preserving the unidimensional model simplicity.