Testing of Current Carrying Capacity of Conducting Tracks in High Power Flexible Printed Circuit Boards

Abstract

In high power electronic applications, the current carrying conducting tracks of the printed circuit board (PCB) and the components generate heat. For the proper working of the circuit, this heat must be expelled to the surroundings. In flexible PCBs, heat sinks cannot be used for reducing the temperature. We developed a multilayer flexible PCB structure that includes a heat conducting thick layer and electrically non-conducting thin film layer. In this paper, we have tested a flexible PCB for high power applications and evaluated its performance when the current flows through the conductive tracks in it. The heat generated by current flowing through the copper conducting tracks of the PCB at different current conditions and its convection is analyzed in relation to board dimensions and structure. The ANSYS Workbench is used to test the temperature and current capabilities of the PCB. The test results show that the temperature of the flexible PCB gets reduced as the area of convection increases. In addition, the current carrying capacity of tracks in the flexible PCB is also increased. The high-power handling flexible PCB will help the heavy power electronics boards to reduce size and give PCB designers more freedom to design a layout fitting any shape of the cabinet of the device.