Experimental investigation on paraffin wax-based heat sinks with cross plate fin arrangement for cooling of electronic components

Abstract

Modern electronic devices need an efficient thermal management system to remove heat effectively under different heat loading conditions. The present paper reports the thermal performance of different heat sink (HS) configurations with various cavities (1, 4, 9, 16, 25, and 36) formed by rectangular cross plate fins arrangement integrated with phase change material (PCM) through experimental investigation. Here, paraffin wax and aluminum are used as PCM and heat sink materials, respectively; tests are conducted for three different heat flux values (q″= 1.5, 2.0, and 2.5 kW m−2) and different PCM volume fractions (φ= 0.0, 0.5, 0.8, and 1.0). Results are presented in the form of the transient temperature variation in the HS base, the time required to reach the required set point temperature, enhancement ratio, thermal capacity, and thermal conductance values. The maximum reduction in temperature is found to be 19 and 19.5% for HS with 36 cavities compared to HS with a single cavity at q″=1.5 and 2.0 kW m−2, respectively. In addition, HS with 36 cavities exhibits the maximum enhancement ratio of 6.5 at q″=1.5 kW m−2 for SPT of 65 °C and heat capacity of 1.63 during post-sensible heating for q″= 2.0 kW m−2. The thermal performance is found to increase with the increase in the number of cavities and PCM volume fractions. The study suggests that the solidification time takes approximately twice that of the melting time; forced convection cooling needs to be applied to enhance the cooling rate of PCM. Graphical abstract: [Figure not available: see fulltext.] © 2022, Akadémiai Kiadó, Budapest, Hungary.