Calculation Method for Forced-Air Convection Cooling Heat Transfer Coefficient of Multiple Rows of Memory Cards

Abstract

Forced-air convection cooling of high-power electronic devices is widely used, but it has a problem that a rise in temperature of the air used to cool the upstream devices decreases the cooling capa-bility for the downstream devices. In this study we made an experimental apparatus including a memory card array and measured the effect of the rise in temperature of the air on the heat transfer coefficient of the memory cards that were downstream in the air flow. Using these mea-surements, we devised a simple calculation model, called the thermal diffusion layer model, to calculate the heat transfer coefficient of multiple rows of memory cards. The rise in temperature of downstream memory cards due to higher temperature air can be evaluated with a parameter representing the delay of thermal mixing for air. The heat transfer coefficient calculated with the thermal diffusion layer model agreed with our experimental results.