A Study on Infrared Emissivity Measurement of Material Surface by Reflection Method

Infrared emissivity is one of the most important factors for the temperature measurement by infrared thermography. Although the infrared emissivity of an object can be measured from the ratio of blackbody and the object, at room temperature it is practically difficult to measure the value due to the background effects. Hence, quantitative reflectance of bare steel plate and the surface of coating was measured by FT-IR spectroscopy and emissivity was calculated from this. The emissivity of polished bare steel surface was from 0.06 to 0.10 and the value for the unpolished bare steel can not be achieved because optical characteristics changes of surface roughness induces erroneous results. Emissivity of transparent paint coated steel was from 0.50 to 0.84. Depends on the IR absorption regions, which is a characteristic value of the coating, emissivity changes. This study suggests surface condition of material, thickness, roughness et cetra are important factor for IR optical characteristics. Emissivity measurement by reflection method is useful technique to be applied for metal and it with coating applied on the surface. The range of experimental errors of temperature can be narrowed by the application of infrared thermography from the measured thermal emissivity.