Library Subscription: Guest

ISSN Online: 2377-424X

ISBN Print: 978-1-56700-474-8

ISBN Online: 978-1-56700-473-1

International Heat Transfer Conference 16
August, 10-15, 2018, Beijing, China

COMPACT LIQUID COOLING SYSTEM FOR HIGH POWER IGBT MODULES IN EV/HEV APPLICATIONS

Get access (open in a dialog) DOI: 10.1615/IHTC16.ctm.023833
pages 3833-3839

Abstract

In this work, a compact liquid cooling system based on a copper foam is suggested for thermal management of multiple high power IGBTs for EV/HEV applications. The cooling performance is investigated using both numerical simulations and experiments. Three-dimensional, steady state, incompressible flow and conjugate heat transfer simulations are performed to analyze the thermal and hydraulic performance of the suggested system. Required pressure drop and thermal resistance along the mass flow rate are evaluated to compare the cooling performance with previously-reported cooling systems including microchannel cooling system. Combining an effective configuration of coolant paths and high porosity (0.9) copper foam leads to relatively lower pressure drop of the cooling loop and the enhanced convective heat transfer is achieved due to expanded heat exchange area. The numerical and experimental data match fairly well, and the results show that multiple heating elements have uniform cooling performance as a result of coolant spreading effect through the copper foam. About 4 times smaller required volume was calculated with the suggested cooling system than a previous cooling system. Our work offers the compact liquid cooling system based on the copper foam that can be adopted to electronic cooling system such as IGBT cooling module in EV/HEV applications.