Comparative analysis of multichannel cold plates with various corrugated channel structures and dual flow outlets

Abstract

A multichannel cold plate is widely used for cooling electronics because of its high performance. This study aims to shed light on the different engineering effects on the characteristics of this cold plate. Splitting the outlet flow and using corrugated channels with different structures for six novel models are the proposed ways to achieve the best thermal performance with the least pressure losses. In addition to the straight channels, the corrugation of all channels was tested in three configurations: fully wavy, straight-wavy and wavy-straight. The corrugation of only the middle channels was tested in three shapes: zigzag, trapezoidal and wavy. Numerical simulation of the cold plate was conducted using the finite volume technique, and the results were verified experimentally for water flow rate ranging from 0.002 kg/s to 0.006 kg/s. Compared with the conventional single-inlet, single-outlet multichannel cold plate, the flow splitting at the outlet effectively reduces pressure losses even when using corrugated channels. Interestingly, using only wavy central channels is better than using fully wavy channels, achieving the same thermal-hydraulic performance as the fully wavy ones. Both achieved the highest performance evaluation factor of 1.92, thus indicating that the pressure losses for the fully wavy channels are the greatest.