A Heat Transfer Textbook, 4th edition

From the first edition of A Heat Transfer Textbook in 1981, this book was meant to serve students as they set out to understand heat transfer in its many aspects. Whether the reader studies independently or in a classroom is beside the point, since learning (in either case) means formulating and surmounting one’s own questions. Where the book succeeds, it will be because students encounter a series of ‘Oh, now I see!’ moments.

With this edition we continue offering engineering juniors, seniors, and first-year graduate students their grounding in heat transfer – in conduction, convection, radiation, phase-change, and an introduction to the kindred subject of mass transfer. We have designed the book in such a way as to accommodate differing levels according to the instructor’s use of it (or the student’s independent selections). Accordingly, each element of the subject begins simply and may be carried through to the more sophisticated material as the instructor (or the reader) chooses.

In the interest of grounding students in real-world issues, we begin the book with a three-chapter introduction that takes them through the essential modes of heat transfer and gives them an understanding of the function and design of heat exchangers. With that background, students find the later and more complex aspects of the subject much more meaningful.