JPH1197873A - Cooling device - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To obtain a cooling device by which various electronic components such as semiconductor elements or the like to be housed inside an enclosure are cooled efficiently by a method, wherein the heat-dissipating side of heat pipe is connected to a fin, in such a way that the discharged air by a fan crosses a direction in which the fin is passed. SOLUTION: A cooling device 70 is provided inside an electronic or electric apparatus such as a personal computer or the like. Much of the heat from a heat-generating component 50 is moved to a heat-dissipating part 40 by a heat pipe 10 via a heat-conducting block 60, and the heat is dissipated. A heat- dissipating side 100 of the heat pipe 10 is connected to a fin 20, in such a way that the discharged air by a fan 30 crosses a direction in which the fin 20 is passed. As a result, the heat is conducted efficiently from the heat-dissipation side 100 over the entire length of a fin element 201 composed of a corrugate fin. Since a wind which is sent from a fan 30 passes through the fin 20 at high speed in a heat-dissipating fin, the heat which is conducted to the heat- dissipating part 40 by the heat pipe 10 is dissipated effectively, thereby cooling the heat generating component 50 with high cooling performance.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a cooling device for cooling various electronic components such as semiconductor devices housed in a housing of a personal computer, especially a notebook personal computer.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In recent years, in various electric and electronic devices such as personal computers, cooling of semiconductor elements and the like provided therein has attracted attention as an important technical problem. Various methods are known for cooling a heat-generating component such as a semiconductor element provided in a housing. For example, as a method for cooling various components provided inside an electric / electronic device, there is a forced air cooling system using a fan. This is a method in which forced air cooling is performed by introducing and exhausting outside air into a housing of an electric / electronic device using a fan.

[0003] Such a method has an advantage that the internal components are cooled collectively by suppressing an increase in the ambient temperature in the housing, but the cooling of specific components, that is, components that particularly require cooling is insufficient. Prone. In recent years, electric and electronic devices have also been reduced in size, and the internal space of the housing has been increasingly restricted. As described above, when the internal space is limited, it is difficult to realize a sufficient cooling function by the forced air cooling method as described above.

Therefore, a fan 34 is attached to a specific heat-generating component 50 that needs to be cooled in an electric / electronic device 90 (for example, a notebook personal computer) as shown in FIG. 8, and the heat-generating component 50 is intensively cooled. Methods are gaining attention.
There is also known a method of arranging a heat sink 350 between the heat generating component 50 and the fan 35 in the electric / electronic device 91 as shown in FIG. According to such a method, there is an advantage that a heat-generating component requiring cooling can be efficiently cooled.

[0005] In addition, a system using no fan as shown in FIG. 10 is also known. This cooling method includes a metal plate 83 and a heat pipe 16, and the heat of the heat generating component 50 is transmitted to the metal plate 83 and radiated. The heat pipe 16 transfers the heat of the heat generating component 50 to the metal plate 83.
It plays the role of being distributed over a wide area.

[0006]

Although the cooling systems as shown in FIGS. 8 to 10 are effective, it is not easy to realize a higher cooling performance. In the cooling method as shown in FIG. 10, it is difficult to increase the amount of heat radiation from the metal plate 83. Also in the cooling method as shown in FIGS. 8 and 9, since electric and electronic devices tend to be downsized, convection of air by the fans 34 and 35 does not easily occur, and thus it is difficult to increase the air volume by the fans 34 and 35. . Further, since the temperature of the air taken in by the fans 34 and 35 is increased, it is difficult to expect a large cooling effect.

[0007] In addition, as shown in FIGS.
If the fans 34 and 35 are arranged close to the heaters 0 and 50, there is also a problem that dust or dust tends to accumulate on the heat generating components 50 and 50. For example, when the heat generating components 50 and 50 are semiconductor elements, there is a problem that accumulation of dust and dirt on the circuit board may cause a trouble such as an electric short circuit.

Therefore, recently, as shown in FIG. 7, a method has been proposed in which the heat-generating component 50 and the fan 30 are separated to some extent, and heat is transferred using the heat pipe 15 between them.
Has been put to practical use. In this figure, the heat of the heat generating component 50 is once received by the heat transfer block 60, and the heat is further transmitted to the heat pipe 15 and transferred to the fan 30. Fan 30
Then, the heat is dissipated to cool the heat generating component 50. With this method, dust and dirt are less likely to accumulate on the heat-generating component than when the heat-generating component is close to the fan.

A heat pipe 1 as shown in FIG.
The cooling method using the fan 5 and the fan 30 is also effective when the heating component 50 cannot be arranged close to the fan 30 due to the mounting space of the heating component 50. That is, the fan 30 is naturally preferably installed near the outer wall of the housing of the electric / electronic device, but the heat generating component 50 to be cooled is not always arranged near the outer wall of the housing. In such a case, if the cooling method as shown in FIG. 7 is used, the degree of freedom of mounting arrangement of the heat generating component 50 is increased.

In the case of the cooling system shown in FIG. 7, in order to enhance the cooling performance of the heat-generating component 50, the heat of the heat-generating component 50 carried by the heat pipe 15 is more efficiently radiated by the fan 30. It was necessary to do so, and its development was desired.

[0011]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION It is an object of the present invention to provide an apparatus for efficiently cooling various electronic components such as semiconductor elements housed in a housing of a notebook personal computer or the like. The cooling device of the present invention includes a heat pipe thermally connected to the heat-generating component, and further includes a radiator including a fan and a fin portion that is adjacent to or connected to the duct by the fan. The heat radiating side of the heat pipe is connected to the fin portion so as to cross the direction in which exhaust gas passes through the fin portion.

It is preferable that a connecting portion between the heat radiation side of the heat pipe and the fin portion is located above an air suction port of the fan. It is more desirable that the housing constituting the fan unit and the fin unit are integrated.

[0013]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS An embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to FIG. FIG. 1A is a perspective view, and FIG.
Is a front view of a partial section thereof. Cooling device 70 shown
Is provided in an electric / electronic device such as a personal computer, and a heat generating component 50 to be cooled is connected to a heat transfer block 60. One end of the heat pipe 10 is a heat transfer block 6
0 or bonded. Reference numeral 101 in the figure denotes the heat absorbing side of the heat pipe 10.

The heat absorbed from the heat absorbing side 101 of the heat pipe 10 travels in the longitudinal direction of the heat pipe 10 and is radiated by the heat radiating portion 100 (FIG. 1A). The radiating portion 40 in which the fin portion 20 is provided close to the fan 30 is provided with a fin element 201 of the fin portion 20 which is a side surface of the fan 30 as shown in FIG.
The air flows so as to be exhausted through the portion.

The fin portion 20 has a cover 202 except for an inlet side 204 and an outlet side 205 of the air sent from the fan 30.
It is good to make it covered with 203 (see FIG. 1A).
As the fin portion 20, for example, a fin element 201 composed of a corrugated fin formed by corrugating an aluminum sheet.
May be formed by covering with aluminum covers 202 and 203. The fin portion 20 is provided immediately after the outlet of the fan 30, and the wind speed is high and the fin element 20
It passes through section 1 and is discharged.

The heat radiating side 100 of the heat pipe 10 is connected to the fin 20 so as to cross the direction in which the exhaust air from the fan 30 passes through the fin 20. In the example of this figure, the heat radiation side 100 of the heat pipe 10 is fixed using the cover 203 on the upper surface.

The cooling device 70 having the above-described structure is provided in an electric or electronic device such as a personal computer as described above. Most of the heat of the heat generating component 50 is transferred to the heat transfer block 60.
Through the heat pipe 10 to the radiator 40,
The heat is dissipated there.

The heat radiating side 100 of the heat pipe 10 is connected to the fin portion 20 so as to traverse the direction in which the exhaust air from the fan 30 passes through the fin 20. Heat is efficiently transmitted from the heat radiation side 100. Also, the cover 202,
Although heat is also transmitted to 203, these covers 202, 20
3 is also preferably formed of aluminum having good heat conductivity. In addition, it is more preferable that the housing 32 of the fan 30 and the fin portion 20 are integrated, for example, by bonding, because the heat transfer area of the heat radiating portion 40 is increased.

In the heat radiating section 40, the wind sent from the fan 30 passes through the fin section 20 at a high speed.
The heat transferred to the heat radiating portion 40 by the zero is effectively radiated. Thus, the heat generating component 50 can be cooled with high cooling performance.

Further, the cooling device 70 of the present invention uses the heat pipe 10 to radiate heat of the heat-generating component 50 to be cooled.
Heat pipe 1
If the route of 0 is appropriately set, the position of the heat generating component 50 and
There is an advantage that the degree of freedom in designing the position of the heat radiating section 40 is increased.

The forced circulation of air by the fan 30 constituting the heat radiating section 40 can cause dust and dirt to accumulate on the peripheral portion thereof. However, the forced circulation of the heat generating component 50 and the cooling device 70 as shown in FIG. It is desirable that the heat radiating section 40 be disposed at a certain distance from the heat radiating section 40, since the accumulation of dust on the heat generating component 50 is suppressed.

It is desirable to secure a certain space in front of the air suction port 31 of the fan 30 in order to efficiently suck air. Although h shown in FIG. 1A is a gap constituting the space, if the heat pipe 10 is arranged in this space, the space efficiency becomes excellent. Therefore, the connection between the heat pipe 10 and the fin portion 20 is preferably located above the air suction port of the fan 30.

[0023]

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS The present invention will be described based on embodiments. Example 1 A cooling device 70 having a configuration as shown in FIG. 1 was prepared. In this embodiment, the heat-generating component 50 is replaced with a 20 mm wide area.
A 20 mm rubber heater was attached. Fin part 20
The housings constituting the fan and the fan 30 are all made of aluminum having excellent thermal conductivity. The heat transfer block 60 is also made of aluminum. Now, with the fan 30 operating at the rated voltage, the rubber heater was energized with a constant power of 8 W or 12 W to measure the thermal resistance.

In the measurement of the thermal resistance, the temperature at the position indicated by ★ in FIG. 1A (position about 5 mm from the rubber heater, such as being mounted at the position of the heat generating component 50) and the temperature of the air blown by the fan 30 are measured. The temperature difference was calculated as a value obtained by dividing the difference by the input heat. Table 1 shows the results.

As a comparative example, as shown in FIG. 6 (heating parts are not shown), the thermal resistance was measured in the same manner as described above for an example in which the heat pipe 15 was attached to the fan 30. In the above-described embodiment of the present invention, an L-shaped heat pipe 10 is used as the heat pipe 10 and its heat radiation side is attached to the fin portion 20 so as to cross the direction in which exhaust air from the fan 30 passes through the fin portion 20. However, in a comparative example as shown in FIG. 6, a linear heat pipe 15 was used and attached to the fan 30. The results are also shown in Table 1.

[0026]

[Table 1]

Table 1 shows that the embodiment of the present invention is a cooling device which has a significantly lower thermal resistance than that of the comparative example and can realize excellent heat radiation performance.

Example 2 A cooling device 71 having a configuration as shown in FIG. 2 was prepared. The illustration of the heat-generating component is omitted. The heat transfer block 60 and the radiator 40 (the fan 30 and the fins 20) are the same as those in the example of FIG. 1, but the heat transfer block 60 is attached to the heat pipe 11 not at one end but at substantially the center. A heat radiating plate 80 was attached to the heat pipe 11 on the side opposite to the heat radiating section 40. Reference numeral 81 in the figure denotes a mounting bracket.

In the case of this embodiment of the present invention, in addition to the heat radiation at the heat radiation portion 40 provided with the fan 30, there is also the heat radiation by the heat radiation plate 80, so that a higher heat radiation performance is realized.

The operation of the fan 30 can be stopped when the amount of heat radiated by the heat radiating plate 80 is sufficiently large, and the operating load of the fan 30 can be reduced. For example, a system that controls the operation of the fan 30 to be started when the temperature of a heating component (not shown) (connected to the heat transfer block 60) becomes equal to or higher than a certain temperature may be adopted. This extends the life of the fan 30 and contributes to a reduction in power cost. When this cooling device 71 is applied to, for example, a notebook computer, the cooling plate 8
0 should be placed at the bottom of the keyboard.

Incidentally, it is desirable to secure a certain space in front of the suction port 31 of the fan 30 in order to efficiently suck air. H shown in FIG.
Are the gaps that make up the space. Also in Example 2, the same thermal resistance measurement as in Example 1 was performed (power supplied to the rubber heater was 12 W), and at this time, the size of the gap h was changed. Table 2 shows the results.

[0032]

[Table 2]

From the results shown in Table 2, the gap h between the suction ports is 1
mm, the heat resistance is 0.2 ° C /
The value was about W lower. This is equivalent to about 2.5 ° C. in terms of the actual temperature difference between the heat-generating components. Therefore, the gap h
It is understood that it is desirable to secure a certain degree in terms of heat radiation performance. The heat pipe 11 has a diameter of, for example, 3 m.
m, the heat pipe 11
It is desirable from the viewpoint of space efficiency to use this gap as a space for arranging the objects.

Although not shown, if a heat pipe is separately attached to the heat radiating plate 80 to improve the heat uniformity, or if a flat heat pipe is used instead of the heat radiating plate 80, the heat radiating property is further improved.

Embodiment 3 The cooling device 71 of Embodiment 2 shown in FIG. 2 is improved to disperse the heat radiating plate 8 extending to the fan 30 and the fin portion 20.
Example 3 is Example 3 to which Example 2 is applied (see FIG. 3). The heat pipe 12 was fixed by a structure sandwiched between the heat transfer block 61 and the heat dissipation plate 82. The heat pipe 12
The heat radiation plate 82 crosses from below to above. Although not shown, as the fin element of the fin portion 20, an offset fin made of three layers made of aluminum was applied. When the heat dissipation performance of the cooling device 72 was examined, the heat dissipation plate 8 extending to the fan 30 and the fin portion 20 was examined.
It was confirmed that higher heat dissipation performance was realized by applying No. 2.

The heat radiating plates 81 and 82 in the second and third embodiments described above can not only enhance the heat radiating performance but also have a function as an electromagnetic shield in some cases.

Embodiment 4 In the above embodiment, the direction of exhaust by the fan is one direction, but this direction may be multi-directional. FIGS. 4 and 5 show a case where the heat pipes are arranged in two directions. In this case, it is more effective to connect the heat pipe 13 in two directions in accordance with the directions as shown in FIG. Also, as shown in FIG.
Separate heat pipes 14, 140 may be attached to the fin portions 22, 220 in each direction.

[0038]

As described in detail above, the cooling device of the present invention realizes excellent heat radiation performance. Further, by applying the heat pipe, it is not necessary to dispose the heat-generating component to be cooled and the fan close to each other, so that the fan can be arranged at a position where the heat radiation performance is further improved, and high heat radiation performance can be realized. In addition, the accumulation of dust and dust by the fan can be suppressed. Thus, the cooling device of the present invention is excellent.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a perspective view (A) illustrating an example of a configuration of a cooling device according to the present invention, and a partial cross-sectional front view (A).

FIG. 2 is a perspective view illustrating another example of the configuration of the cooling device according to the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a perspective view illustrating another example of the configuration of the cooling device according to the present invention.

FIG. 4 is a main part of another example of the configuration of the cooling device according to the present invention.

FIG. 5 is a main part of another example of the configuration of the cooling device according to the present invention.

FIG. 6 is a perspective view illustrating an example of a configuration of a cooling device of a comparative example.

FIG. 7 is a perspective view illustrating an example of a configuration of a conventional cooling device.

FIG. 8 is a perspective view illustrating an example of a configuration of a conventional cooling device.

FIG. 9 is a perspective view illustrating an example of a configuration of a conventional cooling device.

FIG. 10 is a perspective view illustrating an example of a configuration of a conventional cooling device.

[Explanation of symbols]

 DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 10 Heat pipe 100 Heat radiation side 101 Heat absorption side 20 Fin part 201 Fin element 202 Cover 203 Cover 204 Entry side 205 Exit side 30 Fan 31 Suction port 32 Housing 40 Heat radiating part 50 Heat generating component 60 Heat transfer block 70 Cooling device 11 Heat pipe 80 Heat radiating plate 71 Cooling device 12 Heat pipe 61 Heat transfer block 82 Heat radiating plate 72 Cooling device 13 Heat pipe 21 Fin unit 31 Fan 14 Heat pipe 140 Heat pipe 22 Fin unit 220 Fin unit 32 Fan 15 Heat pipe 34 Fan 90 Electric / electronic equipment 35 fan 350 heat sink 91 electric / electronic equipment 16 heat pipe 83 metal plate 92 electric / electronic equipment

Continued on the front page (72) Inventor Masaru Oumi 2-6-1 Marunouchi, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo Inside Furukawa Electric Co., Ltd.

Claims (3)

[Claims] 1. A heat pipe having a heat pipe thermally connected to a heat-generating component, and a radiator including a fan and a fin adjacent to or connected to the heat pipe by a duct. A radiating side of the heat pipe is connected to the fin portion so as to cross a direction passing through the cooling device. 2. The cooling device according to claim 1, wherein a connecting portion between the radiating side of the heat pipe and the fin portion is located above an air suction port of the fan. 3. The cooling device according to claim 1, wherein a housing constituting the fan and the fin portion are integrated.