Investigation of an improved cold plate design with circuitous minichannel: a computational study involving the effect of conjugate heat transfer

Abstract

Purpose This study aims to investigate a new circuitous minichannel cold plate (MCP) design involving flow fragmentation. The overall thermal performance and the temperature uniformity analysis are performed and compared with the traditional serpentine design. The substrate thickness and its thermal conductivity are varied to analyse the effect of axial-back conduction due to the conjugate nature of heat transfer. Design/methodology/approach The traditional serpentine minichannel is modified into five new fragmented designs with two inlets and two outlets. A three-dimensional numerical model involving the effect of conjugate heat transfer with a single-phase laminar fluid flow subjected to constant heat flux is solved using a finite volume-based computational fluid dynamics solver. Findings The minimum and maximum temperature differences are observed for the two branch fragmented flow designs. The two-branch and middle channel fragmented design shows better temperature uniformity over other designs while the three-branch fragmented designs exhibited better hydrodynamic performance. Practical implications MCPs could be used as an indirect liquid cooling method for battery thermal management of pouch and prismatic cells. Coupling the modified cold plates with a battery module and investigating the effect of different battery parameters and environmental effects in a transient state are the prospects for further research. Originality/value The study involves several aspects of evaluation for a conclusive decision on optimum channel design by analysing the performance plot between the temperature uniformity index, average base temperature and overall thermal performance. The new fragmented channels are designed in a way to facilitate the fluid towards the outlet in the minimum possible path thereby reducing the pressure drop, also maximizing the heat transfer and temperature uniformity from the substrate due to two inlets and a reversed-flow pattern. Simplified minichannel designs are proposed in this study for practical deployment and ease of manufacturability.