Preliminary development of emissivity measurement system at low temperature based on radiometric method

Thermal radiation is a major part of heat transfer in cryogenic systems, especially in vacuum environment. The emissivity of materials is an essential factor of thermal radiation, which is difficult to be precisely predicted by theoretical calculation. Thus, the direct experimental measurement becomes an inevitable, reliable method. In this paper, a preliminary emissivity measurement system using the direct radiometric method was designed and built with a G-M (Gifford-McMahon) cryocooler as the cold source. The sample plate in the apparatus can be cooled to 9.2 K, while the sample thermal radiation shield and the optical path cover can respectively reach 46.7 K and 46.9 K. At present stage, MCT (HgCdTe) detector with an effective bandwidth 2–12 μm was used in this system, which achieved the measurements of emissivities of coating Nextel 811–21, 304 stainless steel and G10 composite from 240 K to 300 K. The reliability of the system was verified by comparing the measurement results with the data already published, and the dependence of the emissivities of these materials on temperature are analyzed.