Thermal Fluid Sciences

Coffee Machine Lab Report

Student Name:

Department of Mechanical Engineering

Table of Contents
1 Introduction.........................................................................................................................................3
2 Equipment...........................................................................................................................................3
3 Methodology.......................................................................................................................................3
4 Observations........................................................................................................................................4
5 Results.................................................................................................................................................4
5.1 Heat loss......................................................................................................................................5
5.2 Cost of keeping the coffee hot.....................................................................................................5
6 Discussion...........................................................................................................................................6
References...................................................................................................................................................6
1 Introduction
Coffee machine consists of a reservoir which contains a specific volume of water. The reservoir contains a
hole through which a tube passes and water flows through this tube. The purpose of this tube is to carry
both hot and cold water. This tube provides a path to water to flow through a pipe made of aluminum.
This pipe transfers the heat from the heating element to water through conduction. There is a warming
plate having a conductive grease that helps to heat up the water more efficiently. The heating element in a
coffee machine has a wire in a coil form. The purpose of keeping this shape is to increase the surface area
and to improve the heat transfer rate. The heating element transfer heat as electric current flows through
it. The aluminum pipe is then connected to another tube. This tube carries hot water to the showerhead.
The tube does this job because when water is heated up and boils by the heating element, the bubbles rise
and carry the hot water along them due to pressure difference. There is a one way valve in coffee machine
which prevents the reverse flow of water and keeps its flow in only one direction i.e. towards the shower
head. After hot water enters the shower head, it is in pressurized form and gets evenly sprinkled over the
coffee beans. Once the coffee beans have been brewed, the heating element keeps the coffee warm. This
helps in keeping the coffee warm for other people in the house.
Heat transfer rate is the basic phenomenon which we see in our daily life. Heat is transferred from one
place or body to another place or body through conduction, convection or radiation. In conduction, heat
transfer takes place between two solid bodies due to interaction of particles. In convection, heat transfers
from one place to another through a medium. This medium is a fluid which can be either a liquid or a gas.
Heat is transferred in convection when fluid flows from one place to another and takes heat energy with it
in the form of temperature. In radiation, medium is not required for heat transfer. There is a material
which is continuously emitting waves in the form of energy. These waves transfer heat to another body
which is in interaction with the radiating body.
In this experiment, the working of coffee machine has been observed and different modes of heat transfer
has been analyzed and bodies and places are identified in order to analyze that through which mode heat
transfer is taking place. Different design considerations are taken into account while designing coffee
machines. First the radiation takes place from heater to heating plate then conduction from heating plate
to aluminum tube and again conduction and also convection from aluminum tube to the water.There are
some problems that can be faced during coffee machine operation. The machine can fail to operate its
function when the switch stops working or the one way valve gets clogged and does not let the water to
flow towards the showerhead. So, the coffee machines should be checked on regular intervals for its
efficient operation.

2 Equipment
Materials and equipment used in this experiment were:

 Water: This is using as a working fluid of coffee machine.

 Coffee machine: Acting as a plant to conduct the experiment.
 Stopwatch: It would be used to measure the change of temperature of water with time.
 Thermocouple: Instrument to measure the temperature of water.
 Mass Balance: It would be used to weigh few things including jug.
 Laptop: To make a comprehensive report of what would be done in the experiment.
3 Methodology
First of all mass of empty jug was determined using mass balance. Then a specific amount of water was
measured by cup lines in a measuring cup. The measured amount of water was poured into the reservoir.
The coffee machine was turned on. The operation of machine was carefully observed. The modes of heat
transfer in coffee machine were analyzed. Coffee machine was let to heat the water. Once the jug was
filled with the original quantity of hot water, the jug was removed from the machine and was placed on
the observation table. The stopwatch was started and the temperature of the water was noted for 30
minutes at regular intervals. The data of water temperature with respect to the time was collected and
arranged in excel. The graph was plotted and analyzed.

4 Observations
Mass of jar = 445g = 0.445kg
Mass of water = 324g = 0.324kg

5 Results
The results of change in water temperature with time are shown below:
Table 1: Temperature of water noted after every one minute for 30 minutes

Time (mins) Temp (c)

0 78.4
1 75.5
2 74.1
3 72.8
4 71.9
5 71.0
6 70.2
7 69.5
8 68.8
9 68.0
10 67.2
11 66.5
12 65.9
13 65.2
14 64.5
15 63.8
16 63.1
17 62.5
18 61.9
19 61.3
20 60.8
21 60.2
22 59.6
23 59.1
24 58.5
 25 58.0
26 57.5
27 57.0
28 56.5
29 56.0
30 55.5
31 55.0
From results in table 1, the graph between time and temperature was plotted, as shown in figure below:

Graph showing change in temperature of heated water over time

90

80 Linear ()
Linear ()
70 f(x) = - 0.68x + 74.71
Temperature, T (degrees celcius)

60

50

40

30

20

10

0
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35
Time, t (minutes)

Figure 1: Graph between time and temperature of water noted at every minute

In order to find the slope of the curve, a linear curve fit was drawn that would pass through the maximum
data points in the graph. So, from regression equation in fig.1, it can be seen that the rate of change of
DT
temperature with respect to time i.e. Dt
= –0.6754 C/min. The reason of plotting all the data points on
the graph to plot regression line was that it could not be predicted that temperature versus time
relationship is linear i.e. temperature of water does not decrease at the same rate as the time passes.

5.1 Heat loss

From temperature gradient, rate of heat loss is determined as:

DT
Q. = mc
Dt
Where, c is specific heat capacity of water; which is 4.18 KJ/kg.C.
So, heat loss is calculated as:
 Q. = 0.324 �4.18(-0.6754) = -0.9147 kW = -914.7077W
The minus indicates that the heat is being lost by the water as the time passes. This would be the power
required by the electric heater to heat up 0.324 kg of water.

5.2 Cost of keeping the coffee hot

In United Kingdom, cost of electricity per watt per hour is 3.80p. If this cost is divided by 3600, then the
cost would be 0.001055p per watt. As the power consumed by the heater is 914.7077W, the cost for this
heating operation would be ( 0.001055 �914.077 ) = 0.96435p.

6 Discussion
The purpose of whole report was to analyze the operation of coffee machine and observe how efficiently
it heats up water to a certain temperature and how much it would consume electricity to do this operation.
There are different modes of heat transfer, taking place in coffee machine. The most important is the
conduction. The conductive heat transfer takes place in the aluminum tube as well as in warming plate.
The heat supplied from the electric heater to the water was through conduction. After that, the whole mass
of water was heated through convection process. One assumption taken in this experiment while
determining the power of heater was that there was no heat lost to surroundings from the coffee maker.
This experiment could have been done in a better way as there was no standard value taken to compare
the results in this experiment. One way to check the validity of the results was to measure the resistance
of electric heater first. Then from this heat generated by electric heater could be determined and from this
value we could compare our experiment results and analyze the further errors in that.
As far as performance of the coffee machine is concerned, the coffee machine should have proper
insulation so that less heat is lost to surroundings from reservoir. There is some error in heat lost
determined in this experiment as the resistance of the jug and convection effects of ambient air were
neglected. By calculating the resistance of glass jug, the heat loss can be determined more accurately.
There might be chances of errors in the results. The causes of those errors include:

 Stopwatch might not be started instantly after jug was removed from coffee machine.
 There might be error in mass balance to measure the mass of jug and water as this parameter was
used in heat transfer equation to determine the heat loss.
 The person who was noting the time might not have noted the time and temperature of water at
that time properly for thirty minutes.
 There might be error in temperature measuring instrument thermocouple
There is an improvement that can be made in the coffee machine for minimum losses and better
efficiency. The coffee can be redesigned to make it from insulating material, with a glass lower at the
middle. The reason for glass is to increase the resistance of the jug at its base. As in conduction, heat
transfer occurs at micro level and it is very fast between solids. When the coffee jug is placed at some
base, there is a contact between two solid bodies through which conductive heat transfer can take place
and heat can loss to surroundings. Due to this reason, bottom of coffee jug should be made of glass so that
heat loss can be decreased and the cost of electricity spent on operating coffee machine can be reduced to
minimum. Another reason for glass material at the base of coffee jug is that it will allow the observer to
look how much coffee is left in the jug.
References
How Coffee Makers Work. (2019). Retrieved 15 December 2019, from
http://home.howstuffworks.com/coffee-maker.html
bill, H. (2019). Compare Energy Prices Per kWh | Gas & Electric Per Unit | UKPower. Retrieved 15
December 2019, from https://www.ukpower.co.uk/home_energy/tariffs-per-unit-kwh
Çengel, Y., & Turner, R. (2001). Fundamentals of thermal-fluid sciences. Boston: McGraw-Hill.