Semiconductor Cooler With Inclined Headers For Even Cooling
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Solution Overview
Problem
Semiconductor devices face challenges in evenly cooling multiple power semiconductor chips while minimizing pressure loss, often requiring high-output pumps due to complex cooling fin designs that increase pressure loss and heat generation per unit area.
Innovation Solution
A semiconductor device design featuring a heat dissipation base with cluster pin or blade cooling fins, a cooler with inclined header parts to manage coolant flow, and strategically positioned substrates to reduce pressure loss and ensure even cooling across multiple power semiconductor elements.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Temperature
If detailed and complicated cooling fins are used to efficiently release heat, then heat dissipation performance is improved, but pressure loss in the cooler increases
Solution Approach 1:
The cooling fins are divided into multiple groups arranged in parallel, with each group having a simplified structure. This segmentation allows the coolant to flow through multiple parallel paths, reducing the overall pressure loss while maintaining effective heat dissipation surface area.
Solution Approach 2:
The cooling fin structure is optimized locally by adjusting the arrangement and dimensions of different fin groups based on the heat generation distribution of the semiconductor chips. This allows efficient heat dissipation without requiring uniformly complicated structures throughout, thereby reducing pressure loss.
2Temperature
If detailed and dense cooling fins are used to cool high-output devices, then heat dissipation performance is improved, but pressure loss increases and larger pumps are required
Solution Approach 1:
The cooling system is segmented into multiple parallel flow paths with simplified fin structures. This reduces the complexity of the cooling fin design while maintaining adequate heat dissipation, thereby reducing pressure loss and allowing the use of smaller pumps.
Solution Approach 2:
The cooling fins are arranged in multiple groups along the flow direction, utilizing the longitudinal dimension of the cooler. This dimensional arrangement provides sufficient heat dissipation surface area without requiring increased fin density in the cross-sectional area, thus reducing pressure loss and pump size requirements.
3Temperature
If cooling fins are designed to cool multiple power semiconductor chips, then cooling coverage is improved, but pressure loss increases
Solution Approach 1:
The cooling fins are divided into multiple groups that correspond to different semiconductor chip regions. Each group has a simplified structure optimized for its local cooling needs, providing comprehensive cooling coverage across multiple chips while minimizing overall pressure loss through the parallel arrangement.
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 design achieves efficient and even cooling of multiple power semiconductor chips with reduced pressure loss, allowing for effective heat dissipation without the need for large pumps, thereby enhancing cooling performance and reducing the maximum temperature of semiconductor chips.
Implementation Method 1
By letting a pressurized cooling medium (also referred to as 'coolant,' hereinafter) flow through the cooling fins, heat generated by the semiconductor chips is efficiently released to the cooling medium
Implementation Method 2
The cooling medium that is warmed up by the heat released from the semiconductor chips is cooled by an external heat exchanger, which is then pressurized by a pump and then returned to the flow path
Implementation Method 3
The cooling medium that is warmed up by the heat released from the semiconductor chips is cooled by an external heat exchanger
Data Source
Figure 1
Figure 2(a)~2(b)
Figure 3(a)~3(b)
AI summary
The invention provides a semiconductor device that exhibits low pressure loss and is capable of cooling a plurality of power semiconductor chips evenly. This semiconductor device is a semiconductor device 1 having a semiconductor module 30 and a cooler 50 for cooling a power semiconductor element mounted in the semiconductor module. A cooling unit 51 of the cooler 50 has: a first header part 54 that has a first bottom surface disposed between a coolant inlet 52 and an end portion of a first substrate 33-1 on the coolant outlet 53 side and inclined toward a bottom plane of cooling fins 41 so that a coolant supplied from the coolant inlet 52 flows toward the cooling fins 41; and a second header part 55 that has a second bottom surface inclined from an end portion of the bottom plane of the cooling fins 41 on the coolant outlet 53 side so that the coolant discharged from the cooling fins 41 flows to the coolant outlet 53.