Passive thermography

The illustration reproduces a historical wooden door. This is warmed up by the room behind it. The different colors (red corresponds to higher temperatures, blue/purple to cooler temperatures) clearly show the different heat transfer through the door.

This heat, in combination with a corresponding material moisture, led to optimal climatic conditions for the growth of insect larvae and thus to damage to the wooden substance.

The windows are installed in the double climate chamber of the Fraunhofer Institute for Wood Research WKI between a cold and warm room. In the steady state at a temperature difference of 20 K, a thermographic image was taken of the windows in each case without and with an insulating facing. The temperature resolution of the infrared camera is 0.010 K.
The split thermographic image shows the same window in the right half with and in the left half without an insulation facing.

In the course of thermotechnical investigations on windows, this example clearly shows the improvement in thermal insulation provided by a facing shell on the frame and sash with the aid of a thermographic image (right half of the image).

The thermographic image clearly shows the heat distribution on the motherboard of a computer. This makes it possible to determine strong thermal gradients and thus the possible limitation of the service life of electronic components.

From the thermographic image, the amount of temperature and its temperature distribution on an iron can be seen.

Thermographic cameras can also detect defects in the material when the materials have very low temperatures (-40°C) or very high temperatures (100°C).