Computational investigation of factors affecting thermal conductivity in a particulate filled composite using finite element method Muhammad Zain-ul-Abdein a,⇑ , Sajjad Azeem b , Syed Mushtaq Shah c a Faculty of Material Science Engineering, GIK Institute of Engineering Sciences & Technology, Topi, Pakistan b Department of Chemical Engineering, UET Peshawar, Pakistan c Université de Lyon, CNRS, INSA-Lyon, LaMCoS UMR5259, F69621, France article info Article history: Received 28 February 2012 Accepted 20 March 2012 Available online 20 April 2012 Keywords: Polymer matrix composite Bakelite–graphite powder Thermal conductivity Finite element method abstract Particulate filled polymeric composites with enhanced thermo-physical properties are highly demanded in electronic industry. This paper presents an experimental and compu- tational investigation of the thermal conductivity enhancement in a bakelite–graphite composite material. The experimental work illustrates an effect of the graphite addition in different volume fractions upon the effective thermal conductivity of the composite. Computational investigation was performed in two parts. The first part explains a devel- opment of experimentally validated finite element models for the estimation of effective thermal conductivity, while the second part demonstrates a detailed analysis of the factors affecting thermal conductivity of the composite. The factors that were examined include particle size with individual constituent properties, and air gaps/voids and interface addi- tions in terms of packing density. The findings showed that not only the finite element sim- ulations may be exploited for the prediction of effective thermal conductivity in a composite material; they may also be helpful in suggesting the optimum particle size and packing density factors to suit the industrial design requirements. Ó 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction Recent developments in composite materials have successfully overcome several limitations in the applications of con- ventional materials faced by manufacturing industries. The electronic industry, for instance, is in a permanent quest of mate- rials with high corrosion resistance, high strength, less weight and high electrical and thermal conductivities. Polymer matrix composites (PMCs) with high electrical and thermal conductivities are a better alternate to metal matrix composites (MMCs), since they offer less weight and ease of fabrication in comparison to the latter. Significant research has lately been devoted, to the development of such PMCs (Azeem & Zain-ul-abdein, 2012; Boudenne, Ibos, Fois, Majeste, & Gehn, 2005; Kim, Choi, Lee, & Kang, 2008; Mamunya, Davydenko, Pissis, & Lebedev, 2002; Tekce, Kumlutas, & Tavman, 2007), where the particulate filled composites (PFCs) with improved thermal/electrical conductivity were proposed. An exhaustive study has also been dedicated over a period of time to the theoretical understanding of the variations in thermo-physical properties of the composite materials. Wiener (1912) and Hashin and Shtrikman (1962) bounds, for exam- ple, provide maxima and minima of these properties where little information is available for a two-phase medium. From the early works of Clausius–Mossotti (Clausius, 1879) and Maxwell (1884), a self-consistent scheme (SCS) evolved, which later on led to the development of an effective medium scheme (EMS) and a differential scheme (DS) of Bruggeman (1935). Fur- ther study yielded an effective field method (EFM) with two variants as Mori and Tanaka (1973) scheme and Kanaun and 0020-7225/$ - see front matter Ó 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijengsci.2012.03.035 ⇑ Corresponding author. Tel.: +92 938 271 858; fax: +92 938 271 865. E-mail address: mzainulabdein@gmail.com (M. Zain-ul-Abdein). International Journal of Engineering Science 56 (2012) 86–98 Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect International Journal of Engineering Science journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ijengsci