5th Mechanical Engineering Post Graduate Students’ Conference MECHPGCON2019,

Board of Studies (Mechanical Engineering), Faculty of Science and Technology, Savitribai Phule Pune University, Pune, Maharashtra,
India Department of Mechanical Engineering, Amrutvahini College of Engineering, Samgamner; 21-22 June 2019

A critical review of phase change material for

thermal management of electronic devices
1 1
Sachin Belgaonkar, Reasearch Scholar, Ujwal Gawai, Assistant Professor, Department of
1 1
Mechanical Engineering , JSPM’s Imperial College of Engineering ,Pune,India
 operating temperature. Every electronic device has a operating
Abstract— The electronic devices with increasing power,
smaller size and greater mobility are demanding a good, stable &
Cost Effective thermal Management system. Electronic devices
such as Integrated Circuits IC’s , HEMT, drivers, pulsed power
devices operate best in a limited temperature range as specified
by the device design engineer. Within this temperature range the
life , performance, reliability of device increase significantly. In
this paper we will analyse design consideration of Phase Change
Material (PCMs) used in heat sink to increase its temporary
thermal storage capacity and maintain fairly stable temperature
during the operation of electronic device even if the heat output
from the device is transient in nature i.e it changes w.r.t time and
cycles from low heat output to high heat output during its
operation. We will study the addition of fins in heat sink
alongwith PCMs to increase the thermal conductivity and allow
faster heat transfer between the heat sink and PCM which will
reduce the thermal gradient between the two and help maintain
temperature within the operating range. In this paper we will
analyze the design consideration required for PCM based heat
sink and the criteria used for selection of PCM, the criteria for
determining the volume of PCM required, the optimum ratio of
fin volume to PCM volume, the temperature distribution along
the PCM material in the cavity as it is melting and the
temperature graph vs time vs heat energy . Numerical methods
will be employed alongwith CFD simulation for achieving above
objective. The results showed that using PCM material in heat
sink lead to enhancement of cooling performance, better
temperature control, reduction in the size of heat sink required.
2 2
temperature range which is suggested by the device design
engineers when operated within this temperature range the
device performance is optimal, life is increased, reliability is
increased alongwith efficiency of the device.
The traditional cooling techniques are no longer sufficient for
modern electronic devices which have become more powerful
and small at the same time. The challenge is to quickly
takeaway heat from the device without letting the device
temperature of Tj – Junction temperature to get to high.
Modern Electronic device like IC’s , Mosfet , Amplifiers are
so powerful and small that they will burnout within minutes or
seconds of switching on without thermal cooling provided by
either heat sink or heat pipe. Also these devices may not
necessarily run at high temperature all the time but
intermittently. But for heat sink calculation process the heat
energy loss or Ploss is considered as the maximum power loss
or heat loss that the electronic device may experience during
its operation. Phase change embedded heat sink on the other
hand can be designed for average heat loss expected by
calculating the heat loss across a cycle and then averaging it.
Basically the Phase change embedded heat sink will absorb
exceess Ploss during peak output and later release it when the
Ploss drops below average

Index Terms—
Phase change Materials
Heat sink
Heat flux
Surface area
Thermal conduction enchancing

I. INTRODUCTION

T He Electronic devices are increasingly finding there way

in our day to day life. They have been a significant part of
modern civilization as we know today from domestic,
industrial, communication, medical, transportation to various
other applications. But the unprecedented growth in electronic
devices and constant striving for high power small devices is
demanding an effective thermal management system.
Electronic devices emit large quantities of heat as waste
energy this problem has only grown severe with ever
increasing high powered small size devices. For electronic
devices to work efficiently it needs to maintained at its
In this paper we will explore one technology that is
experiencing tremendous growth in a variety of civil &
military application. It is temporary thermal storage / Phase
change material also known as PCM. The common solution is
PCM heat sink. The goal of this paper is to understanding of
PCM including some aspects of design, that need to be
explored when investigating potential PCM solutions. We will
start with a general overview of PCM including how it
 5th Mechanical Engineering Post Graduate Students’ Conference MECHPGCON2019,
Board of Studies (Mechanical Engineering), Faculty of Science and Technology, Savitribai Phule Pune University, Pune, Maharashtra,
India Department of Mechanical Engineering, Amrutvahini College of Engineering, Samgamner; 21-22 June 2019

functions , common PCM and key material properties. From during phase transfer. This enables the temperature to be
there we will design critical Fin volume & Void Allocation controlled very finely to melting temperature of PCM. During
the phase transition a materials latent heat increases
II.LITERATURE SURVEY dramatically which allows it to store thermal energy for some
duration of time typically which can either be in minutes ,
[1] A novel design of heat sink with PCM for electronics seconds or some time hours. The major benefit of integrating
cooling M. Jaworski, R. Domanski PCM is that it will maintain its melting temperature during the
In this paper the author discusses about the challenges of phase transition. Depending upon how much PCM is in the
modern electronic components which emit high amout of heat system and the power being applied to it heat sink storage
as loss during their operation. It describe the use of PCM in capacity can be a couple of seconds, minutes or even few
hollow tube which are arranged in array on the base of heat hours
sink. The heat sink manages to maintain very good
temperature control despite varying heat load.the fluctuations
in heat loss is absorbed by the PCM in the tubes and III a) BASICS
temperature is maintained at fairly stable condition
The main property of phase change materials is the latent heat
of energy which is heat energy absorbed/emitted by the
[2] A numerical method for PCM-based pin fin heat sinks
material during melting process/solidification process. PCM
optimization R. Pakrouh ,M.J. Hosseini
typically can absorb multiple order of magnitude of more heat
In this paper the PCM heat conductivity is enhanced by using
than a single phase material.
extended surfaces or fins . the design of fin is optimized like
the height , width and length of fins for achieving maximum
heat transfer to the PCM at the same time increasing the
operational period of time for the PCM before all the solid
melts and the PCM embedded heat sink operates in sensible
heat region which will lead to increase in temperature . for the
purpose Phase change material selected is RT44HC.

[3] Approximate analytical model for solidification in a

finite PCM storage with internal fins. Piia Lamberg Kai
Siren
In this paper the solid – liquid interface is studied which is
result of either melting of solid or the solidification of liquid
PCM . As the phase change occurs the solid liquid interface
also travels. It is very essential to calculate the position of this
interface to have a better study of behavior of PCM under heat
load. The author has presented a simple analytical solution to
the PCM solid liquid interface at the time location and
temperature gradient of the fin.

[4] Thermal Performance of Phase Change Material (PCM)

based Pin-Finned Heat sinks for Electronics Devices: Effect of
Pin Thickness and PCM Volume Fraction
Adeel Arshad, Hafiz Muhammad Ali, Muzaffar Ali, Shehryar
Manzur
In this paper the author has done experimental study to
determine the performance like operation duration time and
temperature. PCM is selected as paraffin wasx for this study.
As Paraffin wax is kown to have low thermal conductivity it
needs TCE Thermal conduction enchancing to work
effectively. The TCE used is rectangular shape fins by this
author. The result is obtained by comparing the volume
fractions of different fin configuration to obtain the optimal
configuration which will give highest operational time and
temperature within operational limit.
III. TECHNOLOGY OVERVIEW
As it is obvious by the name PCM operates by using phase
change. PCM has high latent heat of energy which it absorbs
while melting or release while solidification to the surrounding
The graph 1 explains the effect .The temperature is plotted on
Y axis and Heat Q plotted on X axis. The red shows sensible
heat that causes direct temperature increase. The black line
shows temperature distribution of PCM. When the PCM reach
its melting point it maintains almost constant temperature as
per its nature as seen in lightblue shaded area. It maintains that
temperature range until all of the PCM is melted, then it will
return to the sensible heat regime
III b) Benefits of using PCM
  Temporary heat storage
 Less weight than equivalent heat sink without PCM

 Compatibility with various heat sink materials

 Functions reliably over many heating and cooling
 cycles
 Completely passive requires no moving parts.
 5th Mechanical Engineering Post Graduate Students’ Conference MECHPGCON2019,
Board of Studies (Mechanical Engineering), Faculty of Science and Technology, Savitribai Phule Pune University, Pune, Maharashtra,
India Department of Mechanical Engineering, Amrutvahini College of Engineering, Samgamner; 21-22 June 2019

Some challenges that need to be addressed is very low thermal

conductivity of these materials particularly paraffin wax which
is widely used in different applications and relatively high cost
of high purity PCM although low cost low purity PCM are
also available.

IV. PCM SELECTION

In designing a PCM heat sink a very critical parameter is of
selection of PCM itself the key attribute is selection of a PCM
that has a melting point at a temperature acceptable for device
efficient operation
Essential properties to consider
  Melt temperature range
  Compatibility with base metal
  Type of PCM
 Purity of PCM desired
 Capacity of temporary thermal storage
required Once the potential materials have been
identified they should be evaluated for storage capacity
including fin thickness, required PCM volume and
weight.
Hydrated salt are another category of PCM that have high
PCM Melt Fin Latent PCM Heat latent heat of energy for given volume and weight and have
temp volume(%) heat Mass Storage good thermal conductivity for nonmetals and less volume
range (KJ/Kg) (Kg) (KJ) change between phase change (Solid and Liquid). They are
(Celsius) not commonly used as they are highly corrosive and long-
A 58-62 10 240 2.1 504 term reliability is bad Other PCM materials like non organic
B 61-63 10 230 2.0 460 paraffin and metallic and liquid - gas phase change materials
C 60-62 10 260 1.8 468 are available but tend to be used for this applications
Table no :1 Different heat storage values for types of PCM
IV b) Paraffin wax
In the table above you can see three different types of As mentioned earlier paraffin waxes are the most widely
PCM (values only for representation) having approx. used PCM because they are chemically compatible with
same melting temperature range and same fin volume wide range of metals as well as non-metals. They have large
density. The heat storage is different for every type of latent heat capacity and can be used for wide temperature
PCM due to different latent heat value. operating range
A table no - 03 below shows some paraffin waxes along with
IV a) Types of PCM chemical formula being used in electronics application due to
There are several factors while selecting a PCM. An melting temperature range being favorable.
good PCM will have a high latent heat of energy, good
thermal conductivity, specific heat, density and high
reliability during repeat thermal cycles and predictable
freezing pattern.

In table no-2 green shows attractive feature and red indicates

drawbacks. There are several types of PCM like Paraffin ,
Non-Parrafin Organics, Hydrated salts, Metallics. Paraffin
waxes are the most commonly used pcm because they have
higher Latent heat per unit kg, have a large melting point
range, provide reliable cycling and are not corrosive,
V. DESIGN CONSIDERATIONS OF PCM HEAT SINK
chemically inert although they have a drawback of low
PCM heat sink modules are sealed leak tight and the internal
thermal conductivity which can be managed by proper heat
fin design is critical to operation. We will discuss on
sink design with internal fin in PCM cavity. When designing
optimizating the fins for proper melting of PCM and void &
the Paraffin PCM Heat sink void management is important
pressure considerations.
because the volume of solid increses by approx. 8-15 percent
during the phase change.
 5th Mechanical Engineering Post Graduate Students’ Conference MECHPGCON2019,
Board of Studies (Mechanical Engineering), Faculty of Science and Technology, Savitribai Phule Pune University, Pune, Maharashtra,
India Department of Mechanical Engineering, Amrutvahini College of Engineering, Samgamner; 21-22 June 2019

space or void to avoid high thermal gradient in case of large

void space and structural failure if the void is small. The angle
of inclination or the orientation of the heat sink w.r.t gravity
should be taken into consideration while designing void space.

Fig no – 01 Model of PCM filled cavity

In the first step to design a PCM embedded heat sink we

have to firstly calculate the heat loss by the device or P loss
which can either be given by the device manufacturer or
calculate by determining the efficiency of the device and what
percentage of input energy is being converted into heat energy.
The variation of heat loss w.r.t time should be considered and
an average value of heat loss should be considered also its is
desirable to have some temporary thermal storage time which
will act as buffer before the PCM heat sink gets to hot and Fig no – 03 Schematic of PCM filled cavity
reduces the performance of electronic device or totally shuts it V.a) Theoretical Calculations :
down. By factoring all the parameters the temporary thermal
energy storage duration should be determined. Once the The main objective of a heat sink is to reduce the junction
required time is calculated then the suitable material should be temperature of the electronic device to a temperature range
selected as per the temperature range and the volume of PCM which is optimal for its performance and life .
required should be determined.
Consider a Electronic Device
The flowchart for designing of PCM embedded heat sink is
Type of device: Mosfet TO-220
given with steps. The first step will be by determining the heat
Peak Heat Loss Ploss = 6W
loss Ploss from the device to calculate the volume of PCM Rtjc = 0.825 oC/W Resistance junction to Case
required. This will help in determining the required volume of Rtja = 62.50 oC/W Resistance junction to Ambient
the PCM which is based on temporary thermal storage time ….( Technical Data Sheet)
required and heat flux from the electronic device.As the PCM Ta = 25 oC
is known to have less thermal conductivity . It is necessary to
have extended surfaces or fins for additional heat conduction Case 1 :
to the PCM and reduce the conduction resistance to the PCM. Consider the electronic device has no heat sink of any form
This will help in reducing the heat gradient of the heat sink. A Then we need to find out junction temperature Tj
thermal analysis is required for to determine the heat transfer
between heat sink and PCM and to track the solid-liquid Ploss=6W
interface. As PCM is housed in a sealed cavity . the pressure
in the cavity rises as a result of temperature increase this Tj = ?
makes it a pressure vessel by design the structural design of
PCM embedded heat sink is crucial for safe operation. Rja =62.50 oC/W

o
Ta = 25 C
ambient

Rtja = Tj - Ta
Ploss
Tj = Rtja x Ploss + Ta
Fig no – 02 Flowchart for design Tj = 62.50 x 6 + 25
In a PCM embedded heat sink the major challenge is of open Tj = 400 oC
space or void management . As we already know that PCM
expands while absorbing latent heat . So it is necessary to As per the above results it is very clear that junction
provide some space for the PCM to expand freely. This space temperature is very high at 337.50 oC . Which is 5 times more
is generally 8- 15 % of volume of PCM which depends on the than the safe operating temperature of the electronic device.
material used. It is crucial to have just the optimum amount of
 5th Mechanical Engineering Post Graduate Students’ Conference MECHPGCON2019,
Board of Studies (Mechanical Engineering), Faculty of Science and Technology, Savitribai Phule Pune University, Pune, Maharashtra,
India Department of Mechanical Engineering, Amrutvahini College of Engineering, Samgamner; 21-22 June 2019

Case 2 : Tj = 73.57 oC
Consider the electronic device has heat sink of any form
Then we need to find out junction temperature T j Analtyical method also indicate similar temperature for sink

Material of heat sink: Al6063

Thermal conductivity: 200W/m-K
Specific Heat : 0.9J/g oC
….( asm.matweb.com)

Fig no – 04 Model of heat sink

Dimesnsions : Fig no – 05 Temparature distribution of heat sink
Width : 30mm Case 3:
Length : 80mm We consider heat sink with PCM
Base height : 5mm PCM name: Paraffin Wax C25H52
Fin Thickness : 1.2mm Melting temperature Tf: 54.0 oC …. ( EPA DSSTox)
No of fins : 5 Latent heat : 220 J/g
Fins spacing : 6mm Specific heat Cp : 2.9 J/gK
Emissivity : 0.85
Convection : Natural (horizontal) The PCM Paraffin wax will be housed in a cavity that will be
enclosed air tight. The cavity will contain 15 % as void
volume and it will be placed between heat sink and the
Ploss=6W Thermal interface material.

Tj = 73.57

Rjc = 0.825 oC/W

Tc = 68.62
o o
C C
Rtcs =1.10 oC/W

Ts = 62.02 oC
o
C oC Fig no – 05 Model of PCM filled cavity
Rsa =6.17 oC/W Crossection area of each cell = 25.50 x 4
= 102mm2
o
Ta = 25 C Volume = Area x Length
= 102 x 76.16
ambient = 7813.2 mm2 = 7.38 ml
Mass of Paraffin Wax Present = Volume x Density
= 7.38 x 0.90
Rtsa = Ts - Ta = 6.64 gms
Ploss In Earlier case the temperature at case and sink interface is
Rtsa = 6.17 oC/W 68.62 oC
Rtcs = 1.10 oC/W Thermal interface material resistance If the PCM heat sink is introduced between traditional heat
Total resistance in series sink and the case. The PCM heat sink will absorb energy at
Rts = 6.17 +1.10 + 0.825 =8.095 oC/W specific heat rate and then latent heat before again getting into
Tj = 8.095 x 6 + 25 specific heat regime.
 5th Mechanical Engineering Post Graduate Students’ Conference MECHPGCON2019,
Board of Studies (Mechanical Engineering), Faculty of Science and Technology, Savitribai Phule Pune University, Pune, Maharashtra,
India Department of Mechanical Engineering, Amrutvahini College of Engineering, Samgamner; 21-22 June 2019

cm2 which is equal to 6.64 gms . PCM used is Paraffin wax

o
At 54.0 C the PCM will absorb heat with no further rise in C25H52
temperature till all the PCM is melted.
V d.)Geometric Modeling
Energy absorbed by the PCM = Latent heat x mass
= 220 x 6.64
= 1460.8 J

Now heat emitted from device = 6W or 6 J/s

Time of thermal storage available = 1460.8/6

= 243.5 sec or ~ 4min
If the heat loss is transient in nature for example for 2min it is
2W then again it is 6W for 2 min this will help to keep the
temperature of device in healthy range and also will
accommodate some high heat loss for limited time and thus
not reducing performance or damaging the device. Fig no – 06 Temperature distribution of heat sink

Heat load simulation is performed on ansys using steady state

Thermal Analysis method .In engineering data all necessary
parameters like material property is put .Geomtery is loaded
and in setup all intial and boundary condition is specified.
Convection constant is loaded for PCM Heat flux is scheduled
and the simulation is performed.

VI. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

The analytical result are very close to the theoretical result

Graph no – 03 Temperature profile of heat sink
V c.) Problem definition
For modeling purposes we consider a heat setup on a PCM
heat sink base . This heater is of 6 W power rating. The heater
will simulate steady state heat load from Electronic device
such as Mosfet . The heater is adiabatically insulated and all
the energy is directed towards the heat sink . Temperature of
the whole module is taken by averaging the temperature input
from different thermocouples. Also the type of convection
available is natural convection . Ambient temperature is taken
as 25 degree celcius. The heat sink module is enclosed
structure with PCM filled in a cavity with internal fins to help
efficient heat transfer to the PCM and also lower the gradient.
The PCM heat sink is made of aluminium material .It has a
cavity in which PCM is filled with some air gap or void for
expansion when PCM changes phase from solid to liquid.
Dimensions of PCM are Width is 30mm Length is 80mm and
height is 10mm. The total surface area of the heat sink is the
cavity of heat sink in which PCM is housed is 5mm in height
and wdth is 26.6mm Length is 76.6mm. The heat sink has
internal rectangular fins which have volume ratio of 12% to
that of the cavity. Volume of PCM in the cavity is 7.813 ml or
and they suggest equally that PCM performs very well in its
job to act as a thermal storage for electronic devices . It can
hold a good amount of latent heat for small amount of PCM .
the PCM heat sink also rovides buffer for the electronic
device should the heat loss P loss is above the average due to
some load or conditions for a short period of time. The PCM
heat transfer can be increased by the use of extended surfaces
so more area is in contact with the PCM and this address the
problem of low heat conductivity of the PCM. For transient
loads the PCM can be designed for time average heat load
rather than peak heat load as in case of conventional heat
sink.this helps in better temperature control and smaller size
of heat sink.
VII. REFERENCES
[1]A novel design of heat sink with pcm for electronics
cooling
M. Jaworski, R. Doma_ski Institute of Heat Engineering,
Warsaw University of Technology Nowowiejska 21/25, 00-
665 Warsaw, Poland
[2]Three-dimensional transient cooling simulations of a
portable electronic device using PCM in multi-fin heat sink
Yi-Hsien Wang , Yue-Tzu Yang
Department of Mechanical Engineering
National Cheng Kung University, Tainan, 70101, Taiwan
[3]A numerical method for PCM-based pin fin heat sinks
optimization
R. Pakrouh a, M.J. Hosseini b,⇑, A.A. Ranjbar a, R.
Bahrampoury c Energy Conversion and Management 103
(2015) 542–552
 5th Mechanical Engineering Post Graduate Students’ Conference MECHPGCON2019,
Board of Studies (Mechanical Engineering), Faculty of Science and Technology, Savitribai Phule Pune University, Pune, Maharashtra,
India Department of Mechanical Engineering, Amrutvahini College of Engineering, Samgamner; 21-22 June 2019
[4]An experimental study on effect of inclination angle on the
performance of a pcm-based flat-type heat sink
[5]Application of TCE-PCM based heat sinks for cooling of
electronic components: Areview SantoshKumarSahoo n,
MihirKumarDas,PrasenjitRath School
ofMechanicalScience,IndianInstituteofTechnology,Bhubanes
war751013,India
[6]Approximate analytical model for solidification in a finite
PCM storage with internal fins Piia Lamberg Kai Sir_en
Helsinki University of Technology, HVAC Laboratory, P.O.
[7]Experimental and numerical investigation of low melting
point metal based
PCM heat sink with internal fins Xiao-Hu Yanga,b, Si-
Cong Tana,b, Yu-Jie Dinga,b, Lei Wanga, Jing
Liua,b,c, , Yi-Xin Zhoua
[8]Experimental investigation of a PCM-HP heat sink on its
thermal performance and anti-thermal-shock capacity for
high-power LEDs
Yuxuan Wua, Yong Tang a, Zongtao Li a,b,⇑, Xinrui Ding a,
Wei Yuan a, Xuezhi Zhao a, Binhai Yu a Applied Thermal
Engineering 108 (2016) 192–203
[9]Heat Transfer Analysis on PCM Based Heat Sink
Incorporated With Air Convection Azeem Anzar, Azeem
Hafiz P A, N R M Ashiq, Mohamed Shaheer S
[10]On a theory for system-level cooling of close electronics
enclosures by PCM-filled heat sinks—Exact solution and
second law performance limits
C. Naaktgeboren a A.T. Franco b, S.L.M. Junqueira
International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 127 (2018)
535–543
[11]Studies on optimum fins number in PCM-based heat sinks
Rasool Kalbasi a, Masoud Afrand a, Jalal Alsarraf b, Minh-
Duc Tran c, d,
[12]Thermal management of electronics: An experimental
analysis of triangular, rectangular and circular pin-fin heat
sinks for various PCMs
Hafiz Muhammad Ali a, Muhammad Junaid Ashraf a, Ambra
Giovannelli b, Muhammad Irfan
Box 4400, 02015 Hut, Finland
[13]Enhancing the cooling performance of micro pin fin heat
sink by using the phase change materials with different
configurations
Mushtaq Ismael Hasan Mechanical Engineering Department
College of Engineering Thi-Qar University, Thi-Qar , Iraq
mushtaq76h@gmail.com Hind Lafta Tbena Mechanical
Engineering Department College of Engineering Thi-Qar
University,
Thi-Qar, Iraq 2018 International Conference on Advances in
Sustainable Engineering and Applications (ICASEA), Wasit
University, Kut, Iraq
[14]Thermal performance of a PCM heat sink under different
heat loads: An experimental study
Rajesh Baby, C. Balaji
[15]Thermal performance of micro-encapsulated PCM
with LMA thermal
percolation in TES based heat sink
application B. Praveen, S. Suresh
[16]Thermal Performance of Phase Change Material (PCM)
based Pin-Finned Heat sinks for Electronics Devices: Effect
of Pin Thickness and PCM Volume Fraction
Adeel Arshad, Hafiz Muhammad Ali, Muzaffar Ali,
Shehryar Manzur
[17]thermal analysis of heat sink (variable shield profile)
Used in electronic cooling using cfd analysis
Ambeprasad S. Kushwaha 1, Dhiraj K. Patil 2, Vinaykumar J.
Pandey 3,
Sandeepkumar K. Yadav 4, Tushar S. Suryawanshi 5
[18]Thermal performance of phase change material
(PCM) based pin-finned heat sinks for electronics devices:
Effect of pin thickness and PCM volume fraction
[19]Using of phase change materials to enhance the thermal
performance of micro channel heat sink
Mechanical Engineering Department, College of
Engineering, Thi-Qar University, Iraq