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Proceedings of ASME ICNMM2006

4
th
International Conference on Nanochannels, Microchannels and Minichannels
June 19-21, 2006, Limerick, Ireland
Paper No. ICNMM2006-96121
A REVIEW OF MANUFACTURING PROCESSES FOR MICROCHANNEL HEAT EXCHANGER
FABRICATION


Sean Ashman
Mechanical Engineering Department, swa8858@rit.edu
Satish G. Kandlikar
Mechanical Engineering Department, sgkeme@rit.edu

Abstract

This paper provides a summary of the types of manufacturing
processes currently being used in the fabrication of micro heat
exchangers with the main focus on passages with hydraulic
diameter of less than 200 micrometers. The following
manufacturing processes are reviewed: LIGA, Chemical
Etching, Stereolithography, and micro-machining. A
comparison of different techniques related to tolerances,
material compatibility, and ease of manufacturing is given.
Processes capable of high volume fabrication are highlighted.

1 Introduction

Micro heat exchangers are becoming an important area of
interest in many fields of developing technology that require
compact high heat energy removal solutions. Fields such as
MEMS, microelectronics, biomedical, fuel processing, and
aerospace are all pushing the limits of thermal control and are
finding ways to make smaller devices with higher heat flux
potential requiring more efficient smaller heat exchangers to
cool their key working components.

As these advances push the envelope of available fabrication
technologies, it is also important for the technology of cooling
solutions like micro heat exchangers to keep pace in both heat
handling ability and efficient manufacturing processes. Some of
the more established manufacturing process are highlighted and
discussed in this paper. Summaries of basic process, common
materials, sample applications, and tolerances are presented for
the following processes:

Micro-Machining
Diffusion Bonding
Stereolithography
Chemical Etching
LIGA



2 Processes

Table 1 is a compilation from several heat-exchanger studies. It
is sorted first by the manufacturing process and second by
channel hydraulic diameter, starting with the smallest and
going up. It provides a reference for what is possible with the
different types of manufacturing processes and what types of
channel sizes have been achieved.

2.1 Micro-Machining

Micro-machining is the most diverse category of manufacturing
processes available for micro heat exchangers as it covers any
technique in which tools are used to cut, bond, form, deform, or
remove material for the purpose of creation of the channels or
heat exchanger assembly. The most commonly used methods in
the micro-machining category are diffusion bonding and
diamond tool milling/grinding. Advantages of machining are
the broad range of materials that can be processed using this
process. Micro-machining does not limit to materials that etch
well or that are good electrical conductors but simply to
materials that are soft and ductile enough to be machined.


Figure 1 A cross sectional view of microchannels created with
an EDM Micro-Grinding technique, channel width of of 60m,
Kmper et al. (1997).
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Proceedings of ICNMM2006
Fourth International Conference on Nanochannels, Microchannels and Minichannels
June 19-21, 2006, Limerick, Ireland


ICNMM2006-96121
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2.1.1 Diffusion Bonding

Diffusion bonding is a welding process by which two surfaces
are bonded together under high temperature and mechanical
pressure in a vacuum or non-oxygen environment (Kang and
Teng, 1995, Halbritter et al. 2004, and Burger et al. 2001). The
temperatures required for the process are usually 0.5 - 0.8 times
the melting temperature for the material (Kang and Teng,
1995). In cases where the exchanger material is a metal this can
be in the range of 500C - 1000C Halbritter et al., (2004). For
silicon this range is roughly 950C-1100C (Burger et al., 2001
and Zhang et al. 2000).

It is worth noting that diffusion bonding is a secondary process
used to bond together layers into stacks which form a heat
exchanger. Common methods for channel creation prior to
diffusion bonding are chemical etching or micromachining
processes that form the channels.

2.2 Stereolithography

2.2.1 Overview
Stereolithography is a process by which a UV light ray is
scanned through a reactive liquid polymer that hardens creating
a very thin layer of solid. The solid is lowered slightly and this
process is repeated, building layer after layer on top of one
another tracing out the shape of the part being made. The
resulting polymer structure can be formed into a ceramic
through a heat curing process called pyrolysis (Carman et al.,
2002). Stereolithography provides for very flexible design
geometries that may not be considered with other processes
such as Chemical etching or machining. Liu et al (2005)
demonstrated that the stereolithography reduced prototype
fabrication time from 14 hours to 1-4 hours depending on
geometry complexity.

Figure 2 shows a multilayer pattern developed by Carman et al.
(2002). As seen from Fig. 2, complexity of the geometry as
compared to etching processes is quite dramatic with
multileveled cross-shaped patterns that could not be considered
practical to manufacture from an etching standpoint.

Figure 2 Multileveled cross-shaped pattern in silicon, Carman
et al (2002).

2.2.2 Materials used in Stereolithography

The most common materials used for micro heat exchangers
today are Silicates and Silicon Carbides. Stereolithography
requires a modified chemically structured material from this
norm in that it uses SiCN compounds that facilitate the UV
scanning step that drives the entire process. SiCN is less
resistant to combustion and is only considered thermally stable
up to a temperature of 1500C in an air environment [Carman
et al (2002)].

2.3 Chemical Etching

A- Bonded Glass Plate


B- 2-layer Sandwich Design


C- 4-layer Stack Design


Figure 3 A- A cross-sectional view of a bonded glass plate set-
up; B- Inverted-aligned stacks of channels oriented to form
enclosed channels; C- Two (or more) stacks of channel
assemblies used to make a heat-exchanger , Grommol (1994).

2.3.1 Overview
Chemical etching is a process by which a strong acid or base is
used to remove material to shape microchannels. All examples
presented here have used some kind of silicate - either Silicon
Wafers (110) or Glass. The main concept behind the process is
that materials with a directional material removal rate
dependency are required. In the case of Silicon Wafers,
material will be removed at a rate up to 600x faster in one
direction than the direction perpendicular to it, making it ideal
for the fabrication of rectangular micro-channels with very
small cross sections [Harpole and Eninger (1991)]. The
majority of research into micro heat exchangers appears to be
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done with stacks of microchannels fabricated by chemical
etching in silicon with Potassium Hydroxide or Hydrogen
Fluoride. After etching, wafers may be stacked together and
bonded through other processes such as diffusion bonding in
order to create more complex structures or simply capped with
another piece of material, commonly transparent like Pyrex, in
order to study flows through the channels more closely.
Grommol (1994) presents several examples of micro heat
exchanger passages fabricated using this method are illustrated
in Fig. 3.

2.3.2 Silicon Etching
The most commonly used etching processes for the creation of
microchannels in silicon are ones using KOH. Varying the
concentration of the KOH or the process temperature can affect
channel attributes such as roughness as seen in studies by Kang
et al. (1998).

2.3.3 Materials
The most common material used for etching micro and mini
channels for use in heat exchangers is Silicon. Silicon is a good
conductor and has a very useful property where the etching
aspect ratio can be controlled to yield up to a 600:1 channel
depth versus width [Harpole and Eninger (1991)]. As can be
seen in Figures 4a and 4b taken from Kang et al (1998), by
varying parameters such as KOH concentration and
temperature surface roughness of the etched channels can be
drastically effected [Kang et al (1998)].


Figure 4a Roughness plots of etched silicon surfaces at 50C
and different KOH concentrations: A- 20%, B- 35%, C- 50%,
D- 65%

2.3.4 Tolerances
Burger et al (2001) were able to achieve a channel width
tolerance of +/- 0.005 mm on their channels etched to a width
of 0.250 mm about 2% of the target channel width.

Figure 4b Roughness plot of etched silicon surfaces at 90C
and different KOH concentrations: A - 20%, B - 35%, C - 50%,
D - 65%


2.4 LIGA
LIGA is a German acronym for lithography, molding, and
electroplating. X-Rays are projected through a mask onto an
X-ray sensitive photo-resist material that has been bonded to a
conductive substrate material. The X-ray mask enables the
projection to take the shape of the final desired array design.
The conductive substrate and photo-resist material are then
submerged in a Nickel ion solution bath. The Nickel in solution
is electroplated onto the photo-resist material in the desired
arrangement that was set with the X-ray. The nickel structure
can then be used in its own right or as a mold for other
materials. This process may be repeated several times and the
final products bonded together to create more complex builds.
The structures in a version of a LIGA manufactured heat
exchanger can be seen in Figs. 5a and 5b. This structure is
referred to as a pin fin micro heat exchangers by the authors
Marques and Kelly (2004). The pin-fin arrays in Fig. 5a and 5b
were developed for the blades of gas turbine engines, which
require more efficient methods of cooling as technology allows
for an increase in turbine inlet temperatures.

Figures 6 and 7, from Kmper et al (1997), show a micro-mixer
array and compact stack heat exchanger both manufactured
with LIGA processes. The prototype in Fig. 7 consisted of 4
layers stacked opposite to each other with channels 300m
wide and 30m apart. This is a good example of small heat
exchangers with very efficient heat transfer properties used for
the fast thermal control of chemical reactions.

2.4.1 Materials
The final step of the LIGA process is the electrodepostion of a
metal onto the PMMA (poly methyl methacrylate) or, as in the
case of Marques and Kelly (2004), Su-8 2075 structure. A
common material that is used is Nickel. Nickel is relatively
cheap and is easy to etch out if the final product is meant to be
used as a mold for some other material. However, any material
capable of being electodeposited can be used in the LIGA
process [Kmper et al (1997)].
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Figure 5a Expanded view of the surface of gas turbine engine
blade with micro pin-fin array for increased cooling, Marques
and Kelly (2004).

Figure 5b Close up of micro pin-fin structures, Marques and
Kelly (2004).


Figure 6 A nickel micro-mixer array, Kmper et al. (1997).

2.4.2 Tolerances
Moran et al (2004) were able to achieve a tolerance of +/- 0.020
mm on channel dimensions of 0.10 mm hydraulic diameter.

3. Conclusions

Micro heat exchangers are becoming more important in todays
advancing technological fields. The ability to handle high heat
flux densities to control precise chemical reactions or cool the
high-end computer processors is becoming more and more
relevant to their efficient and safe operation. Micro heat
exchangers which benefit from their high surface area to
volume ratios will play an important role in many fields where
thermal issues are becoming a critical problem to deal with than
in the past. Manufacturing processes of today like micro
machining, stereolithography, LIGA, and chemical etching will
help drive the fabrication of these new micro heat exchangers
as well as provide stepping stones for hopefully new and more
exciting and efficient fabrication processes in the future.



Fig 7 Single layer of a micro-heat exchanger stack, Kmper
et al (1997).

4. References

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Table 1 Details of the micro-heat exchanger geometries studied by various investigators.
Author
Channel Size
Hydraulic Dia.
(m)
Material Process
Harpole and Eninger (1991) 0.028e-3 Silicon Etching (KOH)
Kang et al (1998) 0.067e-3 Silicon Etching (KOH)
Price et al (1997) 0.078e-3 Silicon Etching (KOH)
Kuan (1996) 0.1e-3 Silicon Etching (KOH)
Burger et al. (2001) 0.25/0.53e-3 SiN Etching (KOH/HF)
Freitag et al. (2000) 0.3-0.7e-3 Glass Etching (HF)
Gromoll (1994) 0.32/0.64e-3 Silicon Etching (Anisotropic)
Zhang et al. (2000) 0.05-.1e-3 Silicon Etching (DRIE)

Liu et al. (2005) 1.09e-3 SiC Hardened Gel Mold/StereoLithography
Carman et al. (2002) 1.32/1.39e-3 SiCN Micro-Stereo Lithography

Moran et al. (2004) 0.10e-3 Nickel LIGA
Harris et al. (2002) 0.2e-3 PMMA (Nickel mold) LIGA
Harris et al. (2000) 0.15-0.25e-3 PMMA (Nickel mold) LIGA

Kang and Friedrich (1994) ~.080e-3 Copper Micro-Machining (Diamond)/Diffusion Bonding
Halbritter et al. (2004) .082/.133/.2e-3 Base Metal Alloys Micro-Machining (Milling)
Lee et al. (2003) 0.33e-3 PDMS PDMS Molding




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