Anthropometric design of furniture for use in tertiary institutions in Abeokuta, South-western Nigeria

Students sit for most of the time on school furniturein the classroom. However, the design of schoolfurniture in Nigeria using the anthropometric dataof the users has yet to be given adequate attention.This study was carried out to obtainanthropometric data of students in higherinstitutions of learning in Nigeria for the design ofergonomics chairs and tables for use by students inthose institutions. Seven hundred and twenty (720)students in three selected institutions participatedin the study. Various body dimensions (sittingelbow height, shoulder height, knee height,popliteal height, buttock-popliteal length, statureand body weight) of the students were measuredusing standard anthropometer and 5 th, 50th, and95 th percentiles of the data obtained werecomputed using a SPSS 16.0 statistical package.The existing furniture dimensions in the selectedinstitutions were also measured. Based on theobtained anthropometric data, this paper proposesfurniture design dimensions for seat height, seatdepth, seat width, backrest height (upper), armrestand desk height for students in the selected tertiaryinstitutions. The present study may be a pointer tothe effect that in the design of tables and chairs foruse in higher institutions, the anthropometric dataof the Nigerian students were not considered. It ishereby recommended that similar study should becarried out in other sections of the country

EFFECTS OF HEAT SINK COMPOUNDS ON CONTACT RESISTANCE OF POROUS MEDIA

High and low-con duc tiv ity heat sink com pounds were ap plied in suc ces sion on a ther mal probe, which was then used to de ter mine the ther mal con duc-tiv ity and ther mal diffusivity of some po rous me dia at room tem per a ture. The ex per i ment was con ducted sep a rately un der dif fer ent pack ing den si ties and wa ter con tents to see the ef fects of the heat sink com pounds on the ther-mal prop er ties at such con di tions. High con duc tiv ity grease in creased the val ues of ther mal con duc tiv ity con sid er ably and thus re duces the con tact re sis tance, with in crease in bulk den sity at air-dry con di tions, but had vir tu-ally no ef fects on its ther mal diffusivity. It how ever de creased both the ther-mal con duc tiv ity and ther mal diffusivity with wa ter con tent in cre ment. The ther mal prop er ties ob tained with out ther mal grease vary con sid er ably from those with the heat sink com pounds as wa ter was be ing ap plied. The vari a-tion how ever re duced also con sid er ably to wards sat u ra tion. Key words: thermal conductivity, thermal diffusivity, bulk density, contact resistance, heat sinks, water conten

Determination of thermal conductivity of rocks samples using fabricated equipment

The aim of the paper is to describe how inexpensive/simple physics equipment was fabricated and used in the determination of thermal conductivity of rock samples. We used the experimental techniques known as transient method of measuring thermal properties of rock samples at ambient temperature. We investigated samples found in five locations/region (Ewekoro, Ile-Ife, Igara, Ago-Iwoye, Abeokuta) in South western Nigeria. Those samples are limestone, dolerite, marble, gneiss, and granite. Although the samples are multi-mineral as revealed by photomicrograph, the thermal conductivity results obtained 1.40, 1.50, 1.57, 1.75, and 2.94 W/m°C, respectively, are found to be consistent with the ones in literature where highly expensive and sophisticated (not easily affordable in developing nation) equipment are used.