On the Macroscopic Thermal Properties of Syntactic Metal Foams

This paper attempts to cover the thermal processes in syntactic metal foams. Regularshaped cubic closed‐cell structures with spherical pores are investigated by means of the finite element method. Based on the numerical modelling of the microstructure, the effective macroscopic thermal properties are evaluated. Different relative densities (0.95 ‐ 0.5) and different base materials (aluminium and iron) are considered. Furthermore, the influence of the geometry, i.e. spherical ‐ cubical for 3D and circular ‐ rectangular for 2D models, is investigated. The focus is on such cellular materials where the transport of heat is dominated by solid conduction and thermal radiation; contributions from gaseous conduction and convection are neglected.