Heat pipe with PCM for electronic cooling

This article experimentally investigates the thermal performances of a heat pipe with phase change material for electronic cooling. The adiabatic section of heat pipe is covered by a storage container with phase change material (PCM), which can store and release thermal energy depending upon the heating powers of evaporator and fan speeds of condenser. Experimental investigations are conducted to obtain the system temperature distributions from the charge, discharge and simultaneous charge/discharge performance tests. The parameters in this study include three kinds of PCMs, different filling PCM volumes, fan speeds, and heating powers in the PCM cooling module. The cooling module with tricosane as PCM can save 46% of the fan power consumption compared with the traditional heat pipe. (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.