Additive Manufactured Heat Sink with Integrated Pulsating Heat Pipe

Inhalt:
Additive manufacturing is used to create an optimal design of heat sinks. The advantage is the degree of freedom in the design, but the disadvantage is the lower thermal conductivity of additive manufactured parts compared to traditionally manufactured equivalents. In this study, a new approach to massively increase the thermal performance of 3D printed heat sinks is presented. By using an integrated pulsating heat pipe (PHP), the thermal resistance of the heat sink is reduced up to 70%. The PHP channels form a closed loop and a passive, self-oscillating flow is established, without the need of any external device. In this way, the weight can be reduced by 30% and the heat conductivity of the heat sink can be significantly improved by a factor of 4.