An Experimental Assessment of Computational Fluid Dynamics Predictive Accuracy for Electronic Component Operational Temperature

The flow modeling approaches employed in Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) codes dedicated to the thermal analysis of electronic equipment are generally not specific for the analysis of forced airflows over populated Printed Circuit Boards. This limitation has been previously highlighted [1], with component junction temperature prediction errors of up to 35% reported. This study evaluates the predictive capability of candidate turbulence models more suited to the analysis of electronic component heat transfer. Significant improvements in component junction temperature prediction accuracy are obtained, relative to a standard high-Reynolds number k-e model, which are attributed to better prediction of both board leading edge heat transfer and component thermal interaction. Such improvements would enable parametric analysis of product thermal performance to be undertaken with greater confidence in the thermal design process, and the generation of more accurate temperature boundary conditions for use in Physics-of-Failure based reliability prediction methods. The case is made for vendors of CFD codes dedicated to the thermal analysis of electronics to consider the adoption of eddy viscosity turbulence models more suited to board-level analysis.