Thermodynamics Decoded: A Concise Companion to any Introductory course on Engineering Thermodynamics

by Matthew Clarke

Thermodynamics has traditionally been regarded as a difficult course due to the fact that it is a science laced with abstract quantities and semantics. However, thermodynamics doesn’t have to be so difficult! After more than a decade of teaching thermodynamics at both the undergraduate and the postgraduate level, I found that there were certain concepts, quantities and figures that seemed to be more perplexing, to students, than others. While all of these perplexing concepts were extensively covered in the textbooks that I used, what I came to believe was that the textbooks had too much detail, which was needlessly confusing large numbers of students.

This concise text is meant to be an accompaniment to any textbook that is used in an introductory engineering thermodynamics course. It is not meant to be a replacement for your textbook. Instead, this manuscript is designed to distill your textbook to the bare basics and present the most important information in a manner that is more readable than a full sized textbook. The manuscript is designed to accompany a typical 12 week undergraduate course that focuses on the first and second laws of thermodynamics. This manuscript can also be used as a review for subsequent thermodynamics classes at both the undergraduate and the post graduate level.

Rather than presenting worked numerical examples, this manuscript focuses on general tips on how to set up problems rather than on numerical examples. As well, this manuscript addresses the most common questions that I am asked, from year to year, with respect to each topic. Each of the sections in the manuscript is between one and three pages and each section corresponds to approximately one lecture in a typical twelve week course.

96 pages, Kindle Edition

Published January 8, 2015