Linear Thermal Expansion Table • 57 Building Materials

By Jack Gray, Roof Online Editor • Last updated October 1, 2022

Table of Contents

• What is the Coefficient of Linear Thermal Expansion?
• Coefficient of Linear Thermal Expansion Explained
• Variations in Values
• Check with the Manufacturer!
• About Our Thermal Expansion Chart
• Table of Coefficients of Linear Thermal Expansion for Building Materials

What is the Coefficient of Linear Thermal Expansion?

The coefficient of linear thermal expansion (CLTE) is the change in the length of a quantity of material as a fraction of the original length of the material per degree of temperature change.

So when you see a manufacturer’s technical data sheet express the CLTE as “in/in•°F” (or very often as “in/in/°F”), you can read that as “change in length (measured in inches) per linear inch of material per degree of temperature change”.

Coefficient of Linear Thermal Expansion Explained

If the CLTE of a material is one millionth of an inch, that means that for every degree of temperature increase, one inch of the material will expand to be 1.000001 inches long.

For a ten foot long (120 inches) piece of material (a sheet of metal, for example), that translates into an increase of 120 millionths of an inch for the whole piece of material for a one degree change.

For a 100 degree increase, that means the original ten foot section will add 12,000 millionths of an inch to its length. The original ten foot section will now be 10 feet and 0.012 inches long.

(One millionth of an inch is not a typical CLTE, all of the materials listed below have much larger CLTE’s.)

Variations in Values

Please note that variations in product material formulations, differences in manufacturing processes, and the temperature range during the expansion or contraction (e.g., the temperature rises from 0°F to 50°F vs. rising from 70°F to 120°F) can all affect actual thermal expansion values.

Built-up roof membranes, for instance, have much larger CLTE’s from -20°F to +30°F than they do from +80°F to +130°F. The CLTE of concrete varies according to the type of aggregate material used in the mix.

The roofing membrane materials listed below will typically develop smaller CLTE’s as they age.

Check with the Manufacturer!

These thermal expansion values are meant to provide a general idea of how much various materials expand and contract due to temperature change, and should not be used if precise values are needed for critical engineering calculations.

When precision is necessary, always refer to the data sheets of the actual, specific product you intend to use. If the data sheets do not provide a coefficient of linear thermal expansion, contact the technical department of the product manufacturer or material provider.

See our Manufacturer Directory for a huge list of building product manufacturers’ websites.

About Our Thermal Expansion Chart

The following table provides the coefficients of linear thermal expansion and representative thermal expansion values for various building materials.

Where possible, the values were taken directly from manufacturer technical data sheets and reflect the coefficients of linear thermal expansion for specific, representative products.

In a few cases, the values we give were calculated by averaging manufacturer or producer data from more than one source, or were taken from a non-commercial source that we consider authoritative.

We discuss thermal expansion here, but everything applies in reverse for thermal contraction: as the temperature decreases the material contracts.

Table of Coefficients of Linear Thermal Expansion for Building Materials

To convert inch decimals to fractions, see our Inch Fractions to Decimals to Millimeters Table.