MINIMIZING TEMPERATURE MEASUREMENT ERRORS IN SOLIDS USING A THERMOCOUPLE-PLUG ASSEMBLY

The steady state temperature distributions in a solid slab with and without a thermocouple-plug assembly were obtained using the TOSS (Transient Or Steady State) code in cylindrical coordinates. The temperature measurement errors due to the presence of the thermocouple-plug assembly were investigated by systematically varying the slab thermal conductivity, plug thermal conductivity and the depth of the mounting hole. The plug thermal conductivity which gives zero measurement errors for a given solid substrate material and hole geometry was obtained. A set of curves relating the solid substrate and plug thermal conductivities and the depth of the hole for zero measurement errors are presented.