Effect of aluminum-foam heat sink on inclined hot surface temperature in the case of free convection heat transfer

Abstract

The need to more powerful electronic chips cause more heat generation as a consequence. So it leads to apply metal foam heat sink as a powerful cooling methods. The objective of this paper is to experimentally investigate the effect of inclination angle on the temperature of a heated surface with and without metal foam in the case of free convection heat transfer conditions. Experimental modeling has been conducted using an electrical resistor on an aluminum plate with and without aluminum metal foam in different angles with respect to the horizontal direction. The results show that the temperature variations have a linear dependency to the sine of inclination angle up to 45° and 60° for plate with and without metal foam, respectively. The slope of the lines are positive in low power input and negative in high power input. The effect of applying metal foam depends on the input power and inclination angle. In the presence of foam, the surface temperature has a decrease of 16 °C with respect to a flat plate. The maximum cooling efficiency using foam is about %17 at 90° inclination angle.

Keywords

• Heat sinks
• Metal foam
• Surface temperature
• Free convection
• Inclination angle