EXAMPLE 6.

2-3: Heat Sink Design

You are designing a passive heat sink for an electronic component. Plates of copper with
thickness thc = 1.5 mm extend between two parallel surfaces, as shown in Figure 1. The space
between adjacent plates forms an open channel. The copper is sufficiently conductive that these
plates can be assumed to be isothermal. (This assumption could be confirmed by computing the
fin efficiency of the plates.) The copper plates, and therefore the channels, are L = 25 cm long in
the direction of gravity. The surfaces are W = 10 cm wide and separated by a distance H = 10
cm.

W = 10 cm
T∞ = 20°C
H = 10 cm copper plates
g

Ts = 80°C
thc = 1.5 mm
p
L = 25 cm

Figure 1: A heat sink fabricated using copper plates that extend between heated surfaces.

The heat sink is placed in stagnant air at a nominal temperature of T∞ = 20°C and the plates are
maintained at a temperature of Ts = 80°C.

a.) Determine the plate-to-plate pitch (p in Figure 1) that maximizes the rate of heat transfer
from the heat sink.

The known information is entered in EES:

"EXAMPLE 6.2-3:Heat Sink Design"

$UnitSystem SI MASS RAD PA K J
$Tabstops 0.2 0.4 0.6 3.5 in

"Inputs"
th_c=1.5 [mm]*convert(mm,m) "plate thickness"
L=25 [cm]*convert(cm,m) "length of channel in the gravity direction"
W=10 [cm]*convert(cm,m) "width of plates"
H=10 [cm]*convert(cm,m) "distance between plates"
T_s=converttemp(C,K,80 [C]) "plate surface temperature"
T_infinity=converttemp(C,K,20 [C]) "air temperature"
The properties of air (βa, ka, μa, ρa, ca, νa, αa, and Pra) are evaluated at the film temperature
using EES' internal property functions for air:

T∞ + Ts
T film =
2

T_film=(T_s+T_infinity)/2 "film temperature"

beta_a=volexpcoef(Air,T=T_film) "volumetric coefficient of thermal expansion"
k_a=conductivity(Air,T=T_film) "conductivity"
mu_a=viscosity(Air,T=T_film) "viscosity"
rho_a=density(Air,T=T_film,P=1[atm]*convert(atm,Pa)) "density"
c_a=cP(Air,T=T_film) "specific heat capacity"
nu_a=mu_a/rho_a "kinematic viscosity"
alpha_a=k_a/(rho_a*c_a) "thermal diffusivity"
Pr_a=nu_a/alpha_a "Prandtl number"

In order to develop the model, a plate-to-plate pitch of p = 5.0 mm is used; this value will be
parametrically varied in order to determine the optimal value. The channel spacing (S) is equal
to the plate-to-plate pitch less the plate thickness:

S = p − thc

p=5 [mm]*convert(mm,m) "plate-to-plate spacing"

S=p-th_c "channel spacing"

The Rayleigh number based on the channel spacing is:

g S 3 β (Ts − T∞ )
RaS =
υα

The average Nusselt number ( Nu S ) is computed using the correlation provided by Eq. (6-87).

Ra_S=g#*S^3*beta_a*(T_s-T_infinity)/(nu_a*alpha_a) "Rayleigh number"

Nusselt_bar=Ra_s*S*(1-exp(-35*L/(Ra_S*S)))^(0.75)/(24*L) "Nusselt number"

The average heat transfer coefficient is computed according to:

Nu S k
h=
S

According to the definition of the heat transfer coefficient for an open channel flow, Eq. (6-86),
the heat transfer for a single plate ( q plate ) is:

q plate = 2 h LW (Ts − T∞ )

h_bar=k_a*Nusselt_bar/S "heat transfer coefficient"

q_dot_plate=2*W*L*h_bar*(T_s-T_infinity) "per-plate heat transfer rate"

The number of plates that can be installed in the heat sink is:

W
N plate =
p

and the total heat transfer rate for the heat sink is:

qtotal = N plate q plate

N_plate=W/p "number of plates"

q_dot=q_dot_plate*N_plate "total heat transfer rate"

The solution for p = 5 mm is qtotal = 47.7 W. The value of p is commented out and a parametric
table is created that includes the variables p, q_dot_plate, and q_dot_total. The value of p is varied
from 1.6 mm (just greater than the plate thickness, which leads to very thin channel spacing) to
5.0 cm (i.e., 2 very large channels). Figure 2 illustrates the total heat transfer rate and the heat
transfer per plate as a function of the plate-to-plate pitch.
160

140

120
Heat transfer rate (W)

100
total heat transfer rate
80

60

40

20
per plate heat transfer rate
0
0 0.01 0.02 0.03 0.04 0.05
Plate-to-plate pitch (m)
Figure 2: Total and per-plate heat transfer rate as a function of the plate-to-plate pitch.

Figure 2 shows that there is an optimal plate-to-plate pitch (around 9.0 mm) that maximizes the
heat transfer rate from the heat sink. The per-plate heat transfer rate tends to increase with pitch
because the developing region extends further into the channel and the fluid in the channel will
warm up less. However, the number of plates that can be used decreases with pitch; the optimal
plate-to-plate pitch balances these effects.

A more exact prediction of the optimal spacing can be obtained using EES' built-in optimization
capability. Select Min/Max from the Calculate menu and then indicate that the variable to be
maximized is q_dot_total and the independent variable is p. Reasonable bounds (0.0016 m to
0.05 m) and a guess (0.01m) must be provided for p. The result is an optimal pitch of p = 9.2
mm which leads to a total heat transfer rate of 153.7 W.