Solid materials chosen for insulation have a low thermal conductivity k, measured in watts-per-meter per kelvin (W·m−1·K−1). As the thickness of insulation is increased, the thermal resistance—or R-value—also increases.
For insulated cylinders, there is a complication - a critical radius beyond which extra insulation paradoxically increases heat transfer. The convective thermal resistance is inversely proportional to the surface area and therefore the radius of the cylinder, while the thermal resistance of a cylindrical shell (the insulation layer) depends on the ratio between outside and inside radius, not on the radius itself. If the outside radius of a cylinder is doubled by applying insulation, a fixed amount of conductive resistance (equal to ln(2)/(2πkL)) is added. However, at the same time, the convective resistance has been halved. Because convective resistance tends to infinity when the radius approaches zero, at small enough radiuses the decrease in convective resistance will be larger than the added conductive resistance, resulting in lower total resistance.
This implies that adding insulation actually increases the heat transfer, until a critical radius is reached, at which point the heat transfer is at maximum. Above this critical radius, added insulation decreases the heat transfer. For insulated cylinders, the critical radius is given by the equation [1]
{displaystyle {r_{critical}}={k over h}} {r_{critical}}={k over h}
This equation shows that the critical radius depends only on the heat transfer coefficient and the thermal conductivity of the insulation. If the radius of the uninsulated cylinder is larger than the critical radius for insulation, the addition of any amount of insulation will decrease heat transfer.