EXAMINATION ON THERMAL ADAPTIVE EFFECT OF POSTURAL ADJUSTMENT OF A SITTING HUMAN EXPOSED IN SPOT AIRFLOW

In this paper, the thermal adaptive effect of postural regulation was examined by simulating the heat discharge from a sitting human body dressed as an office worker in summer, which was exposed in the spot airflow supplied by a personal air-conditioner. At first, the experiments using a thermal manikin were carried out to measure the distributions of skin temperature and sensible heat discharge of the manikin by making it in forward-leaning or back-leaning postures. The flow field around the face was also measured with a PIV system. Next, the coupled simulation method of convection, radiation, moisture and Fanger's neutral model was adopted to simulate the heat discharge from a human body by changing its angle relative to the spot airflow. It shows not significant by not negligible thermal adaptive effect when changing leaning posture of the human body. On the other hand, it indicates the ability to improve the local thermal comfort by changing the human body's angle relative to the spot airflow.