Towards a new approach to concurrent thermal design of PCBs

Abstract: "A thermal design methodology suitable for concurrent design of cost-driven electronic systems is proposed and exemplified for a sample printed circuit board (PCB). The design methodology utilizes an evolutionary concept, in which the analysis tools are capable of adjusting their level of complexity as the design evolves, initiating with rough approximate analyses and culminating with a conjugate conduction/convection simulation for a portion of the sample of the PCB. The level of approximation included at each stage is selected with consideration of both time and accuracy constraints. The importance of considering the conjugate problem in generating heat transfer coefficientsfor electronic packages is discussed.The proposed thermal design methodology is then applied to the Vu-Man artifact and the results are described to illustrate the effect that upstream thermal information can have on the evolution of a design."