Method for specific heat measurement of thick film layers

A method of simple implementation is presented for the measurement of the specific heat of thick film layers. It has to do with a system, operating at room temperature in accordance with a dynamic non-adiabatic technique, whose function regards the transient phase of a heating process between two steady states. It consists of a compact ensemble of three elements: a small plate thermistor serving as a heater, an alumina disk as a sample support and a tiny calibrated thermistor as a temperature sensor. The voltage across the heater and temperature from the sensor are monitored. An accurate evaluation of the dissipated energy allows the absorbed energy, responsible for the temperature variation, to be brought out. That makes possible the determination of thermal capacity of a small mass material deposited on a substrate. The achievement of the result simply involves the recording of a voltage and temperature during the transient phase, a fitting procedure with given analytical functions and a mathematical elaboration. The measuring system, its calibration procedure together with the transient operation are described. An application concerning screen-printed ferroelectric thick films on alumina substrate is presented and the results discussed.