Experimental studies were performed to study the heat transfer characteristics of an impingement flame jet system consisting of a premixed butane/air circular flame jet impinging vertically upward upon a horizontal rectangular plate at laminar flow condition. There were two impingement plates manufactured with brass and stainless steel respectively used in the present study. The integrated effects of Reynolds number and equivalence ratio of the air/fuel jet, and distance between the nozzle and the plate (i.e. nozzle-to-plate distance) on heat transfer characteristics of the flame jet system had been investigated. The influence in using impingement plate with different thermal conductivities, surface emissivities and roughnesses on heat flux received by the plate was examined via comparison, which had not been reported in previous literatures. A higher resistance to heat transfer had been encountered when the stainless steel impingement plate of lower thermal conductivity was used, which led to a significantly lower heat flux at the stagnation region. However, the heat flux distribution in the wall-jet region of the plate was only slightly affected by using different impingement plates. Because of the significantly lower heat transfer, more fuel was not required to consume and existed at the stagnation region of the stainless steel impingement plate, which would be burned latter in the wall-jet region to release its chemical energy and enhance the local heat flux there. (C) 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.