PS: Is it still an “air gap” without using “noble gases” and just “air”? Thanks so much!
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If you touch a hot thing, you feel how hot it is cos the heat goes right into your hand and may burn you.
If you hold your hand near a hot thing, you feel it’s hot, but you don’t get burned, that’s cos of the air gap.
The heat has to transfer to the air molecules that then bump into your hand and transfer the heat to your skin, and you feel it is warm/hot.
So, not all the heat gets transferred across the air gap.
If we make the air gap be sealed, so it’s the same air stuck in the gap, we can reduce the amount of air particles in there. We can “suck” a bunch of them out. That means there will be less particles of air to take the heat from the hot side, to the cold side. So less heat gets transferred. If we use a Noble gas in the air gap instead of air, and we suck a bunch of those gas particles out as well. Then there will be even fewer gas particles to carry the heat about. Because Noble gases generally have less particles and more space between the particles than the same amount of air.
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