Abstract
Miniaturization of electronic devices leads to new heat dissipation challenges and traditional cooling methods need to be replaced by new better ones. Polymer heat sinks may, thanks to their unique properties, replace standardly used heat sink materials in certain applications, especially in applications with high ambient temperature. Polymers natively dispose of high surface emissivity in comparison with glossy metals. This high emissivity allows a larger amount of heat to be dissipated to the ambient with the fourth power of its absolute surface temperature. This paper shows the change in radiative and convective heat transfer from polymer heat sinks used in different ambient temperatures. Furthermore, the observed polymer heat sinks have differently oriented graphite filler caused by their molding process differences, therefore their thermal conductivity anisotropies and overall cooling efficiencies also differ. Furthermore, it is also shown that a high radiative heat transfer leads to minimizing these cooling efficiency differences between these polymer heat sinks of the same geometry. The measurements were conducted at HEATLAB, Brno University of Technology.
Highlights
With new advancements in electronics, especially in their miniaturization, new cooling challenges need to be met so that the electronics’ efficiency and service life would not decrease
Due to their easy fabrication, low cost and low weight, are already finding their ways in many active cooling applications despite their low thermal conductivity as polymer heat exchangers in cooling electronics and in the automotive industry [1,2,3,4]. Their amorphous structure responsible for their low thermal conductivity prevents their usage in passive cooling applications as heat sinks. This disadvantage could be eliminated if the right fillers with high thermal conductivity would be incorporated into the base polymer matrix using modern production techniques, these composites could be used in electronics passive cooling applications where they would bring with them other polymer benefits [5,6,7,8,9,10,11]
In applications where heat transfer from the heat sink by convection is strictly limited or where their naturally high emissivity would lead to high heat transfer via radiation
Summary
With new advancements in electronics, especially in their miniaturization, new cooling challenges need to be met so that the electronics’ efficiency and service life would not decrease Polymers, due to their easy fabrication, low cost and low weight, are already finding their ways in many active cooling applications despite their low thermal conductivity as polymer heat exchangers in cooling electronics and in the automotive industry [1,2,3,4]. Modern polymer blends offer high thermal conductivity, but in comparison with traditionally used aluminum and copper, their conductivity still remains low approximately by tenfold They could be used in applications where the heat transfer via conduction inside the material is not restricting the overall heat transfer from the cooled part to the ambient, which is typical in passive cooling using a heat sink [4]. In applications where heat transfer from the heat sink by convection is strictly limited (enclosed space) or where their naturally high emissivity would lead to high heat transfer via radiation (applications with high ambient temperature)
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