Three different types of quenching experiment have been conducted with a hollow copper cylinder of 50 mm length, 10 mm I.D. and 32 mm O.D. for pressure from 0.1 to 1.0 MPa, mass flux from 25 to 500 kg m-2 s-1 and inlet subcooling from 5 to 50 K. The thermocouple delay in the installed condition has been carefully calibrated and a two-dimensional numerical method for solving inverse heat conduction problems was used in data reduction. The applicability of the experimental technique and parameter effects of the quenching process were discussed in detail. Quenching boiling curves were compared with the corresponding steady-state boiling curves obtained on the same test section and transient effects with respect to the global inlet conditions have been observed for a certain parameter range. The measured minimum film boiling temperature and critical heat flux were compared with physical models and correlations from the literature and a semi-empirical model for transition boiling heat transfer was proposed which shows satisfactory agreement with the present measurement results.