This paper describes a new method to determine the equivalent heat transfer coefficients, i.e., radial and azimuthal, in CICC's with parallel cooling channels. The method is based on the measurement of the steady state temperature response to a step heating. The experiment is modelled by a set of transport equations for the temperature distribution that contain explicitly the parametric dependence on the transverse heat transfer coefficients. The equations are solved analytically and the values of the equivalent transverse heat transfer coefficients are obtained as the best fit of the experimental temperature distributions. We show the results obtained with the method by application to a short length sample experiment in the SULTAN test facility using an ITER-type CICC with special instrumentation, and with heaters to generate a variety of heat slugs. The values of heat transfer coefficient are consistent with expected values, based in particular on the theory of dispersion in porous media. (c) 2007 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.