The sample thermal conductivity is required as an input to calculate the sample temperature when using the PLX-HotStage. Thermal conductivities of metals are fairly insensitive to microstructure and in general can be specified in a similar way to that in which stiffness is handled during PIP testing — i.e., just identifying the base metal or alloy type should be sufficient to allow a suitable value to be ascribed.
Some default values are provided in CORSICA, but a more comprehensive set is shown in the table below (where T is in °C). The user can specify their own thermal conductivity before performing a test.
