The transient response of heat exchangers plays a significant role in the time-dependent performance of thermal management systems, particularly in resource-limited situations with high power density and fast-acting heat sources. A scaled thermal management testbed with a plate-frame heat exchanger was built to emulate a thermal subsystem. This paper describes a methodology for dynamically characterizing the behavior of a commercial, off-the-shelf plate-frame heat exchanger both experimentally and computationally. Statistical design of experiments principles was used to develop a test plan composed of 20 test cases for dynamic model validation. The dynamic performance of the heat exchanger was evaluated with a physics-based model, and statistical surrogate models were derived from the experimental results. Additionally, a lumped mass model was employed to determine the dynamic parameters of the heat exchanger using the experimental data. The model efficiently and accurately predicts the experimental results across the entire experimental exploration space. The lumped mass model predicts the transient response without using computationally expensive resources such as a full numerical, thermo-fluid dynamic solvers. This approach has significant implications for developing practical models of thermal components particularly for the field of thermal controls. (C) 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.