Environmental Chamber for Investigation of Building Envelope Performance

Abstract

This paper describes the design and development of an environmental chamber for investigation of building envelope performance as a function of heat, air, and moisture transfer, and the interaction between the building envelope and the indoor environment. The environmental chamber is the first of its kind in Canada and is unique in concept. It is located in a specially constructed laboratory of the Centre for Building Studies (CBS), in downtown Montreal. Experiments can be performed on envelope assemblies up to 7.2 m high and 4.1 m wide. The environmental chamber consists of two chambers representing dynamic indoor and outdoor conditions, denoted as hot and cold boxes, respectively. Between the hot and cold boxes, a rectangular frame is sandwiched, in which building envelope components can be built up. A metering box is also located on the hot box side of the test specimen to measure heat flow and temperature drop across it for thermal resistance measurement based on the guarded hot box method. Without the metering chamber, the facility can be used for tests similar to the calibrated hot box method. The second major function of the facility is its use as one large environmental chamber for testing full rooms.