Comparison of the Cooling Performance of Staggered and In-Line Arrays of Electronic Packages

Abstract

The cooling performance of in-line and staggered regular arrays of simulated electronic packages is compared for both sparse and dense packaging configurations. At equal flow rates, staggered arrays exhibit higher element heat transfer coefficients and friction factors than in-line arrays. Furthermore, an increase in the packaging density of the elements results in a moderate reduction in the friction factor with negligible change in the heat transfer coefficient. However, when performance is expressed in terms of heat transfer rate per unit packaging system volume, dense arrays are found to out perform sparse arrays at equal flow rate, applied pressure gradient or pumping power. Furthermore, no significant difference in performance is observed between staggered and in-line configurations when they are compared on the basis of either equal coolant flow pressure drop or pumping power.