Heat sink manufacturing technologies
Heatsinks are an important component in electronic devices to dissipate heat and extend the life of the devices. In recent years, various technologies have been developed to improve the efficiency of heat sinks. These include new manufacturing methods and innovative materials that enable better heat sink designs. These technologies help optimize heat dissipation and distribution and lower the operating temperatures of electronic devices, resulting in better performance, reliability and longer device life.
Heat sink technologies
Extrusion
Extrusion is a process technology in which alloys are formed into objects with a definitive cross-sectional profile without cutting. The raw material is drawn or pressed in the corresponding aluminum alloy as a billet through the so-called die. The result is a comb profile as a bar in lengths of up to 5 meters.
Main features
Design
- Favorable tooling cost (die new profile geometry)
- Inexpensive profiles
Material
- Good thermal conductivity (ribbed bottom)
- Many aluminum alloy EN AW 6060
- Copper CU-ETP 99.9%
Technology
- Standard process tolerance extrusion UNI EN 755|9
Pressed-in cooling fin profiles
The basis for the pressing (pressed cooling fins) is an extrusion profile (extrusion) which is pressed together as often as desired. This allows flexible dimensioning of the width. The height is defined by the selected profile.
Main features
Design
- Scalable heat sink width
- Standard profiles or custom profiles possible
- Non-extrudable" geometries possible
Material
- Many aluminum alloys: EN AW 6060
- Copper CU-ETP 99.9%
Technology
- Low contact resistance between single profiles
- Gap-free surface
Friction Stir Welding (Friction Stir Welding)
Friction stir welding is assigned to the pressure welding processes. In friction stir welding, metals are joined below the melting point. This creates pressure- and vacuum-tight joints without pores and cracks. The technology is mainly used in railroad engineering.
Main features
Design
- Very wide heat sink designs possible with improved fin spacing
Material
- No structural changes
- Without filler materials and large manufacturing losses
Technology
- Seamless joining of two aluminum parts
- Hot forming process below the melting point, fine-grained microstructure
