Monolithic Additive Heat Sink for Compact Cooling
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing electronic modules with heat sinks face challenges in achieving compactness and efficient cooling while ensuring tightness, as conventional manufacturing processes lead to geometrical errors and inefficient heat transfer due to separate production and joining of heat sink parts.
Innovation Solution
A generatively produced monolithic heat sink with a channel system adapted to the topographical distribution of power losses, using metal powder in powder bed layers and selective solidification with an energy beam to create a closed structure with varied channel cross sections and heat-conducting structures, ensuring efficient cooling and reduced external dimensions.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Manufacturing precision
If conventional manufacturing processes are used to produce heat sink parts separately and join them, then the production process is simple and easy to manufacture, but geometrical errors occur and heat transfer efficiency is reduced
Solution Approach 1:
The patent merges multiple heat sink parts into a single monolithic structure produced by additive manufacturing. Instead of separately manufacturing heat sink bodies, cooling channels, and mounting surfaces then joining them through machining or assembly, the entire heat sink is built as one integrated component layer by layer, eliminating geometric errors from joining operations while maintaining manufacturing feasibility through digital process control.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent changes the manufacturing approach from subtractive/conventional methods to additive manufacturing. This parameter change enables complex internal cooling channel geometries and integrated features that cannot be achieved with traditional machining, while the layer-by-layer construction process inherently produces accurate geometries without the accumulation of machining errors or alignment issues from assembly.
2Volume of moving object
If conventional heat sink designs with separate parts are used, then the manufacturing process is straightforward, but the external dimensions are larger and cooling efficiency is reduced
Solution Approach 1:
The patent utilizes the third dimension (vertical layering) to create compact heat sink designs. By building cooling channels and heat dissipation features vertically through the heat sink body using additive manufacturing, the design achieves high cooling efficiency in a reduced footprint. The layer-by-layer construction allows complex 3D channel networks that maximize surface area for heat transfer while minimizing overall volume, something difficult to achieve with conventional planar manufacturing approaches.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent nests cooling channels, mounting surfaces, and structural features within the monolithic heat sink body. The additive manufacturing process allows internal cooling passages to be nested within the heat sink volume, with channels branching and interconnecting in three dimensions. This nesting eliminates the need for separate attached components and reduces external dimensions while maintaining all necessary functions.
3Reliability
If heat sink parts are produced separately and joined together, then the production process is simple, but sealing and tightness are compromised
Solution Approach 1:
The patent merges all heat sink components into one monolithic structure, eliminating sealing interfaces between parts. The additive manufacturing process creates a continuous material structure with no joints, bolts, or adhesives required, thereby completely eliminating leakage paths at interfaces. The only openings are intentionally designed inlet and outlet ports for coolant flow, ensuring reliable sealing while the digital manufacturing process maintains simplicity.
4Manufacturing precision
If monolithic generative production is used, then manufacturing precision and sealing are improved, but the manufacturing process becomes more complex
Solution Approach 1:
The patent replaces complex mechanical manufacturing and assembly systems with an additive manufacturing system. Instead of using multiple machines for machining, fitting, and assembling heat sink parts, a single additive manufacturing device builds the entire component digitally. This substitution reduces overall system complexity despite the advanced nature of the additive manufacturing technology, as it consolidates multiple processes into one automated operation with inherent geometric precision.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
The solution enables a compact electronic module with enhanced heat transfer efficiency, reduced external dimensions, and improved sealing, effectively addressing the limitations of conventional heat sink designs by optimizing the channel system and material distribution.
Implementation Method 1
The heat sink (10) is produced generatively as a monolith (1. H. in one piece) from metal powder in powder bed layers by selective solidification with an energy beam, preferably by melting
Implementation Method 2
solidifying the metal powder of the respective powder bed layer according to the geometry of the channel system, the inlet and the outlet using an energy beam, preferably laser
Implementation Method 3
electronic elements which are arranged distributed over an outer surface on an upper side of the heat sink and are thermally coupled to the heat sink for cooling
Implementation Method 4
a channel system (20) running through the heat sink, which connects an inlet (13) to an outlet (14) for a cooling fluid
Data Source
Figure 1~2
Figure 3~6
Figure 7~8
AI summary
Electronic module with a heat sink (10), preferably a cooling plate, and electronic elements (3a, 3b) distributed over a top surface (11) of the heat sink (10), interconnected in a first layout (1) by means of conductor tracks and thermally coupled to the top surface (11) and/or to one or more lateral surfaces of one or more optional recesses (28, 29) of the heat sink (10) for cooling, the heat sink (10) comprising: (a) an inlet (13) for a cooling fluid, (b) an outlet (14) for the cooling fluid, and (c) a channel system (20) extending through the heat sink (10) with channels (15-19, 21-24) branching inside the heat sink (10) that connect the inlet (13) to the outlet (14) so that the cooling fluid can flow from the inlet to the outlet. (c) wherein the heat sink (10) is additively produced as a monolith.