The study deals with the flow resistance and heat transport properties of woven and knitted wire gauzes stacked in a tubular apparatus. The experimental programme included flow resistance and heat transfer experiments performed for air flow ( Re = 2–300) using three woven gauzes and one knitted gauze. During the heat transfer experiments, the gauzes were heated by electric current flowing directly through them. The models describing the flow resistance and the heat transfer were put forward. Both the models base on the concept of the laminar flow developing in a short capillary channel (i.e. the gauze mesh). The model describing the flow resistance does not contain the experimentally derived parameters thus it may describe a number of wire gauzes offered on the market. The heat transfer results might be described using single empirical equation for all the gauzes studied if the concept of developing laminar flow is applied. The number of the gauze sheets stacked influences neither flow resistance (per single gauze sheet) nor the heat transfer coefficient.