Development of an Internal Liquid Cooling System for CPU using CAE

Abstract

Liquid cooling is currently one of the best and most immediate options for non uniform heat sources, high performance CPU/GPU. One of the main drawbacks of this alternative is that many customers may not be very enthusiastic to install a device that could some how leak into their computers. This project intends to develop a new generation liquid cooling system that is leakage-free. This paper presents the development process of an internal liquid cooling system for Center Process Unit (CPU) or Graphics Process Unit (GPU), which can be installed inside the computer case. Commercial available computer aided design (CAD) software; Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD), rapid prototyping (RP) technology, Computer Aided Manufacturing (CAM) and computer aided engineering (CAE) were used in this forward engineering process for the design and fabrication of the critical parts. Previous work from this project emphasized on the development of an internal liquid pump, mainly by using CAD and PR technology [1]. At current stage the project is emphasized on the design, simulation and testing of different water-blocks, that work best with the flow rate of the internal pump. The optimum water-block design involves major dimensions as well as different internal geometries in order to direct the inlet fluid to a certain specific area and also various structures that can increase the heat extraction process from the CPU/GPU to the exterior of the system. The heat exchange process presents different scenarios; such as outlet fluid temperature, uniformity of temperature distribution, hot spots, pressure drop, etc. The criteria used for determining the optimum design will be discussed using CFD data, mathematical models and experimental results. Finally the results obtained with adequate working conditions as well as the system performance trends are shown graphically.