Session: 6.3 - CFD for sustainable Innovations and Industry Applications

Paper Number: 169226

169226 - A Comparative Study on the Heat Transfer Performance of Heat Sinks With Radial and Parallel Fins Under Natural Convection 

Abstract: 

INTRODUCTION: Electronic cooling is essential for maintaining the performance and longevity of electronic components, particularly in data centers and high-power applications where heat dissipation is a critical concern. Traditional passive cooling methods, such as finned heat sinks under natural convection, provide a viable solution for enhancing thermal management without requiring external power. However, the effectiveness of the heat sinks depends on their geometry, fin arrangement, and orientation. In the current study, a comparative analysis of square and circular base heat sinks with radial and parallel fin configurations is performed. The primary objective is to determine the most effective heat sink configuration subjected to natural convection cooling.

METHODOLOGY: A three-dimensional numerical study was conducted to compare four heat sink configurations: circular base-radial arrangement (CBRA), circular base-parallel arrangement (CBPA), square base-radial arrangement (SBRA), and square base-parallel arrangement (SBPA). The heat sinks were designed to have an equal base and finned area for comparison. A tetrahedral computational mesh was generated and later converted into a polyhedral mesh to reduce the computational time. The governing equations, continuity, momentum, and energy equations, were discretized using the finite volume method (FVM) and converted to linear algebraic equations, which were solved using the multi-grid solver of ANSYS Fluent 2020 R2.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION: Temperature contours and flow patterns were analyzed to gain insights into the fluid flow and heat transfer across the different configurations. In the case of radially arranged fins, all the channels converge towards the center of the heat sink. Therefore, the rising flow from the channels combines to form chimney-like structures. Parallel fin arrangements partially obstruct airflow to the center, resulting in higher temperature regions and less effective cooling than radial configurations.

Both radial configurations display lower maximum temperature, uniform cooling, and lowest thermal resistance values than the parallel fin configurations. CBRA and SBRA configurations show similar thermal resistance, indicating comparable cooling performance for circular and square bases with radial fin arrangements. Compared to the CBPA configuration, the CBRA and SBRA configurations demonstrate a temperature reduction of around 2.1°C. Further, CBRA and SBRA configurations demonstrate 9.2% and 2.4% lower thermal resistance compared to CBPA and SBPA, respectively. This performance difference is due to the radial distribution of fins allowing more uniform airflow through the inter-fin channels, resulting in an even temperature distribution throughout the heat sink.

CONCLUSIONS: Radial fin arrangements on horizontally oriented heat sinks offer superior heat dissipation compared to parallel configurations. Both circular (CBRA) and square (SBRA) bases with radial arrangements show comparable thermal resistance values, approximately 9.2% lower than circular parallel arrangements (CBPA). CBRA or SBRA configurations can be selected for horizontally mounted heat sinks to achieve optimum cooling performance. This comparative analysis provides valuable design insights for thermal engineers in the electronics industry, enabling more efficient cooling solutions for high-power components while reducing energy consumption in data centers.

Presenting Author: Trailokya Tripathy Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur

Presenting Author Biography: