Thermally Conductive Plastic Heat Sink

A bright future for thermally conductive plastics.

Thermally conductive plastic heat sink.

Bayer material science has announced makrolon polycarbonate as the latest addition to its family of heat resistant plastics designed specifically for led heat sink applications. Heat sinks and other heat removal applications are among the last areas where thermoplastics inherent thermal insulators have yet to replace metals. Thermal management once meant a few well placed fans vents and aluminum heat sinks. Lighter weight lower cost and greater impact strength moldability and customization are rapidly driving demand for thermoplastics that help keep electronics lighting and car engines cool.

Until fairly recently that is. Thermally conductive plastic for led heat sinks reduces lighting costs. But today s small hot electronics can benefit from new ways to keep cool like using thermally conductive plastics. Our first commercial product the ice9 thermally conductive filament is the world s highest thermal conductivity 3d printing plastic and can conduct heat 50x higher than traditional plastics.

Modifying plastics to improve their thermal conductivity is a burgeoning area of opportunity for a handful of compounders. With a typical thermal in plane conductivity of 20 0w mk thermally conductive thermoplastics improve cooling and reduce temperatures at the heat source. High structural bond strength in severe environments. With electronic devices gaining power and losing bulk design engineers have really started to feel the heat.

Polyone s thermally conductive compounds are used in automotive and e e applications such as led lighting heat sinks and electronic enclosures. Compared with aluminum this grade of makrolon polycarbonate conduct similar thermal performance while helping to reduce costs and enhance design freedom. And analysis showed that using a metal heat sink with a higher thermal conductivity would have only a minor impact on temperatures and heat management but would have a major influence on cost and weight. With identical geometry a tcpoly 3d printed plastic heat sink 6 w m k can perform within 5 c of an aluminum heat sink despite significantly lower thermal conductivity.

In the e e device the heatsink is assembled together with a heat source in heat conductive communication with each other. The heat sink can be produced from the thermally conductive plastic material by interjection molding of the thermally conductive plastic material optionally followed by applying a coating layer. Their free formability allows heat sink structures to be configured to provide precisely the required heat distribution. Henkel thermal adhesives create a mechanical attachment of a component to a heat sink with thermal transfer properties and without the need for additional fasteners.