Experimental investigation of nanoparticle enhanced polyol solid–solid phase change material aided heat sink with integrated heat pipe for electronic cooling application

Abstract

Solid Solid phase change materials (SS_PCM) based thermal management systems (TMS) integrated with heat pipe are considered as excellent passive thermal management solution for electronic packages. To enhance the thermal conductivity of SS_PCM, nano-enhanced solid–solid phase change material (NE_SSPCM) samples were prepared by incorporating Neopentyl Glycol (NPG) with 1 wt% of Graphene nanoplatelets (GnP), Copper oxide (CuO) and Aluminium oxide (Al2O3) nanoparticles separately and its thermophysical characterisation study was performed. NE_SSPCM packed heat sink integrated with heat pipe was tested at different power levels from 9 to 13 W and its thermal performance was compared with TMS based on Empty heat sink, PCM-packed heat sink and PCM-packed finned heat sink configurations. TGA and FTIR characterisation techniques revealed good thermal and chemical stability for all NE_SSPCM without affecting the structure of NPG. DSC showed reduction in phase transition enthalpy for NE_SSPCM than SS_PCM. Thermal conductivities of NPG with 1 wt% of GnP, CuO and Al2O3 nanoparticles improved with relative enhancement ratios of 1.8, 1.5 and 0.8, respectively. From the experimental analysis, NE_SSPCM with heat pipe configuration showed outstanding average improvement by 7, 4.3 and 4.2 times at 9–13 W. Additionally, by extending safe operational period, all configurations were more effective at lower heat generation rates. In contrast to three nanoparticles, GnP based NE_SSPCM showed outstanding average improvement of 1.8 over NPG for PCM-based configurations. The study concluded that implementation of GnP in SS_PCM assisted heat sinks with heat pipe exhibited maximum enhancement ratio of 11.3 and demonstrated remarkable efficacy in all aspects.