Serial Pump Parallel Cold Plate LAAC Cooling Redundancy
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing liquid-assisted cooling systems for information handling systems require additional cooling components and can experience performance degradation due to preheated coolant, which affects reliability and availability, especially in high-performance environments.
Innovation Solution
A liquid-assisted air cooling (LAAC) assembly with serially connected pumps and parallel connected cold plates provides 1+1 pump redundancy, ensuring that neither cold plate receives pre-heated coolant, maintaining high availability and reliability without additional cooling hardware.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If liquid-assisted cooling is implemented with serial pump configuration, then system reliability is improved through redundancy, but device complexity increases due to additional components
Solution Approach 1:
The cooling system is segmented into two independent parallel cooling loops, each with its own pump and cold plate configuration. This segmentation allows one loop to continue operating independently if the other fails, providing redundancy without requiring a completely redundant dual-pump system. The segmentation of the coolant flow path into separate loops achieves reliability improvement while controlling overall system complexity.
Solution Approach 2:
The cold plate outlets are configured to serve dual purposes: each cold plate outlet can supply coolant to its associated device while also potentially serving as a backup supply for the other cooling loop. This multi-functionality allows the system to maintain cooling capability across different failure scenarios, improving reliability without proportionally increasing the number of dedicated components for each function.
2Device complexity
If coolant is circulated through multiple cold plates in series, then a single pump can serve multiple devices, but coolant becomes preheated which reduces cooling effectiveness
Solution Approach 1:
The coolant circulation system is segmented into parallel loops where each loop maintains its own coolant flow path from the cold plate outlet back to the radiator inlet. This segmentation prevents thermal mixing between loops and ensures that each pump draws from a common cold coolant source rather than from a series configuration where coolant would be progressively heated. The segmentation approach allows multiple devices to be cooled while maintaining low coolant temperature at each cold plate inlet.
Solution Approach 2:
A common coolant supply line acts as an intermediary between the radiator outlet and the parallel cold plate loops. This intermediary ensures that all cold plates receive coolant from the same cooled source (the radiator) rather than from each other in series. The intermediary supply line maintains thermal separation and prevents preheating, allowing multiple devices to be cooled effectively with a single pump serving each parallel loop.
3Reliability
If additional cooling components are added to improve reliability, then system availability increases, but the amount of additional equipment increases
Solution Approach 1:
Multiple cooling functions are merged into a unified parallel loop architecture where cold plate outlets are fluidically coupled to radiator inlets, creating an integrated system that provides redundancy without requiring completely separate backup cooling subsystems. This merging approach achieves reliability improvement through intelligent configuration rather than through simple component multiplication, reducing the total quantity of cooling equipment needed compared to fully redundant systems.
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 LAAC assembly effectively maintains coolant circulation and thermal stability for multiple heat-generating devices, ensuring continuous operation even if one pump fails, without preheating the coolant, thus enhancing the reliability and availability of the cooling system in power-dense environments.
Implementation Method 1
a radiator to convert hot coolant received at a radiator inlet to cold coolant provided to a radiator outlet
Implementation Method 2
a fan assembly including one or more fans to move air through the radiator and cool the liquid coolant
Implementation Method 3
first and second cold plates comprising a thermally conductive substrate and a housing to enclose a CPU or another suitable heat generating device
Implementation Method 4
first and second pumps connected in series with the radiator wherein an outlet of the first pump is fluidically coupled to the radiator inlet and an inlet of the second pump is fluidically coupled to the radiator outlet
Data Source
AI summary
An information handling system includes two or more heat-generating devices and a liquid-assisted air cooling (LAAC) assembly to cool at least some of the devices. The LAAC assembly includes a radiator, first and second pumps connected in series with the radiator. The LAAC assembly further includes first and second cold plates enclosing first and second CPUs or another suitable heat generating device. The first and second cold plates are connected in parallel between an inlet of the first pump and an outlet of the second pump. In this configuration, the serial connected pumps in combination with the parallel connected cold plates provide 1+1 pump redundancy while delivering cold coolant from the radiator outlet to both heat generating devices such that neither heat cold plate receives pre-heated coolant from the other cold plate.