Compact thermal modeling in electronics design Sarang Shidore Flomerics Inc Introduction The challenge of accurately predicting junction temperatures of IC components in system-level CFD simulations has engaged the engineering community for a number of years. The primary challenge has been that near-exact physical models of such components (known as detailed thermal models, or … [Read more...]
A Simple Thermal Resistance Model – Isoflux Versus Isothermal
In most cases today thermal design for electronic products is performed with the aid of sophisticated computational fluid dynamics and heat transfer codes. Nonetheless, there may still be occasions when a thermal designer needs a quick estimate of the external thermal resistance of a package or heat sink that does not warrant the use of powerful computer codes. In such cases an … [Read more...]
CFD Simulations in Electronic Systems: A Lot of Pitfalls and a Few Remedies
Introduction In the past 15 years, we have observed a significant increase in the use of Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) codes to calculate the thermal behavior of electronic systems. The benefits are undisputed when it comes to performing parametric studies in early design phases. However, when the objective is accuracy, the discussion about what we can expect in practice … [Read more...]
Low Profile Heat Sink Cooling Technologies for Next Generation CPU Thermal Designs
Introduction The electronic industry requires increased forced-air cooling limits to cool high-end server CPUs adequately. Improving air-cooled heat sink thermal performance is one of the critical areas for increasing the overall air-cooling limit. One of the challenging aspects for improving heat sink performance is the effective utilization of relatively large air-cooled fin … [Read more...]
CFD Prediction of Electronic Component Operational Temperature on PCBs
Introduction The thermal design of today's electronic equipment relies significantly on the use of Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) software for the prediction of electronics operational temperature. In the early to intermediate product design phase, CFD analysis is used to select a cooling strategy and refine a thermal design by parametric analysis. In the final design … [Read more...]
