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Registered Member #3324
Joined: Sun Oct 17 2010, 06:57PM
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Hey, i recently aquired some Peltair plates, After some playing around with them, i realised they fit quite well under the traditional CM600 size IGBT brick, covering where i would assume the dies would likely be.
Has anyone tried using Peltair's for cooling IGBT bricks and how effective is it?
Registered Member #15
Joined: Thu Feb 02 2006, 01:11PM
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It is important to know that Peltiers are not magical devices. All they do is transfer heat from one side to the other. You still have to have just as much heatsink and air cooling as you would with a regular IGBT set-up as you still have to remove the heat from the one side of the peltier as it will get very hot.
I think you will be better off just using conventional thermal grease and a good heatsink / cooling fan arrangement. I don't think the peltier will provide any benefit whatsoever and probably work worse than just an IGBT and thermal grease.
Registered Member #3324
Joined: Sun Oct 17 2010, 06:57PM
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I understand it is not a magical device and i know how it works, i was just thinking there could be a benefit of keeping the IGBT below room temperature?
I don't know.. just thought it could be a interesting idea :)
Registered Member #10052
Joined: Thu Feb 07 2013, 11:31PM
Location: Overland Park, Kansas
Posts: 78
Have a look at this paper:
Conduction losses remain more or less the same from room temperature down to 100K, then increase.
I would also be concerned about the very low thermal capacitance of a peltier plate. They can only move so much heat at a time, and are otherwise a large thermal resistance. With IGBTs and their negative temperature coefficient, that's a recipe for thermal runaway.
If you were to use them, I would be 200% sure that you have enough plates to move more heat than you expect from the bricks at full-throttle, and would add an intermediate copper block to prevent die temperatures from spiking too quickly.
Registered Member #3324
Joined: Sun Oct 17 2010, 06:57PM
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Interesting Paper, there.
All valid points you raise i guess, I myself have little experiance with many of these things (I really need to get round to doing some projects... i buy the stuff and never have the right timing to finish it...)
I've seen people open up IGBT cases before now... what about drilling holes through the sides of an IGBT, removing the goop and forcing cooling oil though an IGBT? could that potentually improve the lifetime? Afteter all, the cooling oil is being put against the die directly.
Registered Member #3900
Joined: Thu May 19 2011, 08:28PM
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You'd only get a little more surface area more than if you where to cool the conductor plate underneath. Honestly, i'd keep the plate in place. It does the job it was designed to do, and if you don't think that a bolt on liquid cooling plate is enough, then you should consider runnning water directly up against the back of the igbt. I know i've seen a setup like that in one of the older drsstcs from either Finn Hammer or Daniel Uhrenholt. It might be in the Diable Tonnere thread somewhere.
Registered Member #3059
Joined: Tue Aug 03 2010, 04:09AM
Location: My turf
Posts: 18
Here's a few suggestions; water cooling and/or heatpipes.
Water cooling as used in the PCs (I use sealed water cooler in mine) would tend to be much more efficient than peltiers, and going off what I know about IGBTs, I would agree that the peltier is the worst choice of cooling due to resistance loss between Collector and Emitter + Gate Vge variation (consider the tail current right after IGBT is shut down - that's when emitter + collector resistance skyrockets, resulting in chance of IGBT heating).
And CPU heatpipes may also be best for those not wanting water around diodes and transistors - a use for that OEM Phenom II CPU heatsink sitting on your desk collecting dust after yanking the brand spanking new Phenom II CPU outta retail box and use that with aftermarket heatsink.
Registered Member #3215
Joined: Sun Sept 19 2010, 08:42PM
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IGBTs on a copper plate (or multiple copper plates) with a water circuit loop inside the plate(s), a pump, and a heat exchanger which will be a copper block of adequate size with the same water circuit loop inside and a group of peltier coolers sucking calories from that water to a big heatsink
keep in mind the peltiers themselves will have their power consumption added to the produced heat, and the losses etc...
the advantage here is that you can pump heat out of a small area (an IGBT) and span it over a larger area (peltier coupled big heatsink) so a given power dissipation will be easier to dissipate over a given time due to added thermal inertia and absorption capacity
I personally think the main advantage is to be able to regulate loop temperature to say 10 degrees C and have a better control of thermal runaway by alarming and monitoring
this is an advantage only in big setups though, as for power converter setups which use big HVAC groups to keep themselves in tolerable conditions
a small DRSSTC or any other <10kW appliance doesn't usually need active thermal management, and the benefit of solid state (peltier) VS classical HVAC is so small that you'd go HVAC anyway
Registered Member #3324
Joined: Sun Oct 17 2010, 06:57PM
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Shrad wrote ...
IGBTs on a copper plate (or multiple copper plates) with a water circuit loop inside the plate(s), a pump, and a heat exchanger which will be a copper block of adequate size with the same water circuit loop inside and a group of peltier coolers sucking calories from that water to a big heatsink
keep in mind the peltiers themselves will have their power consumption added to the produced heat, and the losses etc...
the advantage here is that you can pump heat out of a small area (an IGBT) and span it over a larger area (peltier coupled big heatsink) so a given power dissipation will be easier to dissipate over a given time due to added thermal inertia and absorption capacity
I personally think the main advantage is to be able to regulate loop temperature to say 10 degrees C and have a better control of thermal runaway by alarming and monitoring
this is an advantage only in big setups though, as for power converter setups which use big HVAC groups to keep themselves in tolerable conditions
a small DRSSTC or any other <10kW appliance doesn't usually need active thermal management, and the benefit of solid state (peltier) VS classical HVAC is so small that you'd go HVAC anyway
This thread was made during a blonde moment
Some useful information there Shrad, i shall keep that in mind if i go to do some higher power stuff in the future!
Registered Member #3059
Joined: Tue Aug 03 2010, 04:09AM
Location: My turf
Posts: 18
But hey, it would have been better to ask the question than to be blissfully ignorant, at least we do have to ask the questions in meanwhile.
The question you asked about the peltiers is pretty informative, and in return, that would have saved you the trouble of toasting those expensive transistors. Once in a while, we all have our "Blonde Moments".
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Peltair cooled IGBTs
