Home     Papers     Reports     Talks     Tools     Links

Tools and information for cryogenics

Thermal conductivity and other tools

Thermal conductivity calculators are available for both aluminium and copper.

These calculators provide a table of thermal conductivity values between 1 and 300 K for pure copper and aluminium of arbitrary purity, and for their alloys. The purity can be specified by a conductivity value at 4 K, a residual resistivity or RRR value, or (for aluminium alloys) by the alloy type.

Some more tools for cryogenics are available here.

Thermal contraction at cryogenic temperatures

The graph below shows the thermal contraction between room temperature and 4 K for some materials commonly used in cryostats:

Thermal contraction of various materials used in cryogenics (per 10^4):
PTFE (Teflon), 211; Nylon, 138; Stycast 1266, 115; Perspex, 112; Lead, 70; Vespel SP22, 63; Stycast 2850 FT, 51; Soft solder (50/50), 51; Aluminium, 51; Silver, 41; Brass (70/30), 37; Copper, 32; Gold, 32; Beryllium copper (Berylco 25), 32; Stainless steel 316, 30; Stainless steel 410, 17.6; Titanium alloy (Ti-6AL-4-V), 17.3; Tungsten, 8.6; Pyrex, 5.7; Invar, 5.2; Silica glass, 0.24

Links to sites with more information on cryogenic material properties can be found here.


Adam Woodcraft
Last modified 2009-08-17