For decades, engineers have looked for ways to lower component and assembly weight to create greener and more economical products. As production processes and raw materials evolve, products can often be manufactured to meet performance requirements with less materials by utilizing more optimal options, or omit certain materials entirely.

Lightweighting was historically a primary concern in the automotive and aerospace industries to optimize fuel efficiency. This is leading to better battery ranges in today’s modern electric vehicles and increased payloads in aircrafts. As other industries turn towards greener, more efficient, and more comfortable solutions, lightweighting is now a common goal for manufacturers and designers of consumer devices, medical equipment, and much more.

What is Lightweighting?

Lightweighting is the process of removing weight from a component or assembly. Designers and manufacturers lightweight products in one of three ways:

Substituting materials: The most common approach to lightweighting is to replace heavier materials with less dense and/or stronger materials and components. With the right design, heavy materials like metals can be replaced with thermally conductive plastics or ceramics in a thermal management solution. High density, heavy weight fiberglass insulation can be replaced with low density polyimide foam, like SOLIMIDE® Foam, in marine and aerospace applications. Engineers constantly source and formulate new materials to meet stringent performance requirements at the lowest possible weight, so reconsidering the materials used in an assembly is an important recurring focus for manufacturers.

Optimizing designs: Instead of substituting materials, another way to remove weight is by implementing different technologies or improving a preexisting design. Incorporating technology such as K-Core encapsulated graphite instead of solid metal for heat spreading or streamlining the geometry of a cold plate are both ways to optimize designs to remove weight and increase efficiency.

Eliminating materials: As production processes and materials evolve, components can often be removed from assemblies entirely while still meeting structural, flammability, and thermal requirements. This often goes together with optimizing designs, such as removing cumbersome mechanical fasteners from an assembly by using adhesive-backed foam. We leverage our extensive material selection, manufacturing capabilities, and design expertise to create multilayer stack-ups that combine multiple features into a single component, further helping to eliminate materials from an assembly.

Why is it Important?

Lightweighting has far-reaching implications for a wide variety of industries. In the automotive, eMobility, transportation, and aerospace fields, lowering overall assembly weight increases fuel or energy efficiency and lowers the total environmental footprint. In the consumer electronic and medical industries, lowering the weight of a wearable or handheld device can enhance user comfort, extend the amount of time between recharging, and reduce shipping costs. For industrial and agricultural applications, reducing weight can help increase overall payload and agricultural yield, enhancing overall efficiency and profitability.

With increasingly stringent requirements for safety, sustainability, and efficiency, lightweighting is becoming a focus for every new product. Optimizing weight can lower waste, decrease costs, and enhance product function.

The Boyd Difference

Instead of focusing on removing or substituting a single material, Boyd’s engineers take an integrated approach to lightweighting challenges. Our extensive supplier relationships and innovative design support allow us to guide design decisions, resulting in lower overall assembly weight while ensuring that all performance requirements are met. Our engineers have decades of experience designing components for manufacture (DFM) and optimized assembly. Boyd’s global locations also help lower overall footprint by reducing necessary transit for components and providing vertically integrated solutions.

To learn more about how Boyd can help solve your lightweighting challenges, schedule a consultation with our experts.

In our previous blog, we discussed the benefits and drawbacks of air gap bonding. In the second blog of our three-part display bonding technologies series, we focus on liquid optically clear adhesive (LOCA) bonding.

What is the Process Behind Liquid Optically Clear Adhesive (LOCA) Bonding?

As the name suggests, liquid optically clear adhesive bonding involves bonding layers of the stack-up together with a liquid adhesive. Instead of leaving an air gap between components, the clear adhesive fills the entire space between display layers. Primarily used when bonding together two rigid materials, LOCA bonding is typically chosen for its increased impact resistance, sunlight readability, and optical clarity.

For each display, Boyd’s engineers develop custom fixturing to fit the precise dimensions of the components. Highly precise metering equipment dispenses a consistent amount of liquid adhesive specific to the display design. Our engineers design a program to measure out the proper amount of adhesive in the optimal dispensing pattern unique to each assembly.

The adhesive is cured with UV light in a class 10,000 clean room. Boyd tests and inspects each display with sophisticated methods and equipment to ensure the highest quality assemblies.

Why Choose Liquid Optically Clear Adhesive (LOCA) Bonding?

Liquid optically clear adhesive bonding is used for its strong overall performance and elevated level of impact resistance. Another major benefit of LOCA bonding is high optical clarity, as the liquid adhesive prevents air gaps from forming within the stack-up. LOCA bonding is a popular solution because it is a re-workable process. If needed, the liquid adhesive can be removed and components can be salvaged and re-used, increasing overall manufacturing yields.

LOCA bonding is a robust technology that Boyd has provided to a variety of industries for over a decade. Boyd’s experts leverage proprietary processes and adhesives to provide optimal bonding solutions for specific display requirements. To learn about the other display bonding technologies at Boyd, read the other blogs in this series below:

What is Air Gap Bonding?

What is Optically Clear Adhesive (OCA) Bonding?

When it comes to display development, testing potential materials and technologies under different lighting conditions is a key step. External lighting plays a crucial role in how a part looks and functions, so the component must meet project requirements in all intended settings.

Whether testing for display readability, color matching, backlighting diffusion, or anything else, Boyd has a state-of-the-art Light Lab to precisely control lighting to allow accurate testing for several variables. But how exactly does Boyd’s Light Lab accomplish this?

What’s Inside of Boyd’s Light Lab?

Boyd’s Light Lab is a large, dark room outfitted with various lighting and testing equipment. Keeping the room as dark as possible is essential to measuring accurate lighting values, so the lab’s walls are painted jet black. Even the brightness of equipment monitors, is meticulously controlled, as any additional light can skew readings.

There are two main specialized lighting sources used for illumination and testing within Boyd’s Light Lab –

• Specular Contrast Source – The specular contrast source contains a bright quartz lamp in a specially-coated housing. The housing reflects and diffuses the light from the lamp, allowing it to disseminate to mimic different indirect and ambient lighting conditions.
• Direct Light Source – Direct light sources focus a powerful beam of light directly onto the testing surface.

These two light sources are frequently used in conjunction with each other to replicate outdoor environments, where there would be both direct and diffused lighting.

Across from the light sources is a five-axis motion system that contains an orthogonal goniometer, which holds the device under test. The goniometer can achieve a complete ±90° vertical and horizontal viewing angle, accommodating almost any angle for testing. Custom fixtures designed for each part or device are attached to the goniometer to ensure that they’re held in place while the platform rotates. Optical testing instruments, such as cameras and a spectroradiometer, sit next to the light sources on a separate moveable fixture.

While we’ve spoken previously about our vast display testing capabilities, Boyd’s Light Lab is also used for overcoming tough backlighting and color matching challenges. For highly regulated industries such as the medical or aerospace field, overlays, labels, and placards may need to meet precise color specifications in specific lighting scenarios. Likewise, keypads or displays with backlighting may need to meet color or luminance specifications while in use. Our Light Lab is equipped with multiple cameras and a spectroradiometer to verify color values, luminance values, and color matching.

Boyd can help design custom testing programs to your specifications, saving valuable time in the development process while maintaining product quality and consistency. To learn more about our in-house testing capabilities or discuss your project needs, schedule a consultation with our experts.

Streamlining Medical Wearable Device Design for Performance & Total Cost Optimization – Part 2

We sat down with one of our Field Application Engineers to discuss how to optimize and streamline Medical Wearable Device design. Boyd is an expert in streamlining innovative design, manufacturing, and assembly of medical wearables to help product designers and medical device companies design for excellence (DFx). We help designers consider patient comfort & safety, manufacturing efficiency, product lifecycle, and total cost while navigating complex regulatory processes, providing global agility, assuring business continuity, and accelerating time to market.

Here are common questions we get as we work through Medical Wearable Device design projects with leading medical device design and manufacturing clients:

How do you incorporate electronics and functionality into extremely thin medical wearable devices?

Medical Wearable Device designers are tasked with packing a lot of sensitive and critically important electronics into very thin, streamlined wearables. There are all different types of sensor technology used because as sensors get smaller and less expensive, they’re being integrated into more devices and enabling new medical technology.

Types of Sensors Used in Wearable Devices

Electrocardiogram (ECG) monitoring devices, as an example, sense electrical stimulations based on the location of conductive electrodes worn on the chest. These patches are used to sense things like heart rate, respiratory rate, and arrhythmias. Product designers are also learning how to adapt acoustic sensors to collect heart metrics in different locations like the wrist.

Medical Wearable Devices also sense skin or body temperature with thermistors or thermocouples. Optical sensors on a wearable can measure oxygen saturation. Accelerometers and Gyroscopes can measure the wearer’s activity, movement, and positioning and can measure things like posture and fall detection.

Sharing Medical Wearable Device Data

Each sensor collects data that connects to either an embedded circuit board sandwiched within the wearable patch, or through electrical snap connectors to an external, reusable electronic module affixed to the wearable. Most of these wearable devices are using a Wi-Fi or Bluetooth transmitter to broadcast data to a secure cloud storage source accessed remotely by patients and doctors. Sensors and electronics must also be powered by a small battery which must be considered in the assembly process.

Assembling Medical Wearable Device Components Together

Medical Wearable Devices feature a large amount of very small, precise components. Due to their slim designs, there isn’t much room to accommodate all these components and there is certainly no room for misalignment. Meaning design for manufacturing and assembly accuracy are exceptionally important. Boyd has a lot of complex rotary converting processes that we leverage to cut and assemble with tight tolerance control and registration accuracy in highly automated processes. However, many medical wearable designs cannot be fully converted “on-press” in one continuous process utilizing the efficiency of traditional reel-to-reel converting methods. Because of complexity of the components used like the insertion of an electrical assembly or the attachment of snap connectors or the addition of a molded plastic housing, separate assembly steps are often required. This presents special assembly challenges that require creative process flow and innovative assembly fixture design to achieve efficient throughput and reduced labor costs.

Balancing Volume and Assembly Cost for Medical Wearable Devices

Newer medical wearable designers face special challenges as start-up companies who are trying to introduce a new technology into the market, facing long product development cycles due to regulatory / compliance requirements, and a slow ramp up due to long time of adoption. This means the economics for a fully automated assembly process are typically not feasible given the high NRE investment. Often it comes down to an efficient manual or semi-automated assembly process to help minimize these non-recurring expenses to give your wearable the best chance to succeed in the market. This is where Boyd excels in determining how best to assemble a complicated design in an efficient manner, leveraging the best of our diverse processes to assure trusted quality control. Blending the best of high precision converting with innovative assembly techniques under a highly documented, and process-controlled quality system.

Streamlining Medical Wearable Device Design for Performance & Total Cost Optimization – Part 1

We sat down with one of our Field Application Engineers to discuss how to optimize and streamline Medical Wearable Device design. Boyd is an expert in streamlining innovative design, manufacturing, and assembly of medical wearables to help product designers and medical device companies design for excellence (DFx). We help designers consider patient comfort & safety, manufacturing efficiency, product lifecycle, and total cost while navigating complex regulatory processes, providing global agility, assuring business continuity, and accelerating time to market.

Here are common questions we get as we work through Medical Wearable Device design projects with leading medical device design and manufacturing clients:

What are the best and safest ways to attach Medical Wearable Devices to the skin?

There are two important factors to consider regarding the attachment of the medical wearable: The attachment of the device itself to the skin and the style of conductive electrode used. All devices that attach to the skin must be highly tested and regulated to assure patient comfort and safety. Wearable devices must reliably attach to the patient for intended wear times without irritation while still being removable without damaging patient skin.

Wearable Device Adhesive Considerations

Selecting the right medical grade adhesive for wearable devices are selected based on:

• Required adhesion level (for example higher adhesion is necessary for longer wear times),
• Breathability: water against the skin needs to escape to help promote better wear time
• Ease of Removability,
• Wearer Comfort Level,
• Repositionability or Re-application (if required), and
• other application considerations.

Medical Wearable Design and Use Conditions

The shape and type of the skin contact layer may also be influenced by whether the wearable device needs to protect hydrogel electrodes or sensitive electrical components sandwiched within the patch from outside water ingress. In some unique applications when wear time is short, water ingress is not a factor, and repositionability of the wearable is desired, the adhesive skin contact layer can be foregone and rely on hydrogel components to provide the desired level of adhesion. We collaborate with many global raw material suppliers that are the world’s leading innovators in skin contact comfort and performance to help recommend materials to customers based on these factors to improve product comfort, care, and safety.

Medical Wearable Device Electrode Components

As for the electrode component, one traditional type of material used is open cell, medical grade foam pad saturated with a conductive gel as the electrically conducting medium. This style electrode can be more difficult to handle as a raw material and can impact manufacturing efficiency and cost. We have been steering customers towards hydrogel-based electrodes. Hydrogels present some cutting challenges, but our proprietary converting methods can offer a better option: they’re available in roll form and solid means a component easier to cut, handle, and place with greater quality control. There are several different global hydrogel raw material manufacturers available that offer responsive support and supply chain stability, enabling us to secure dual sources that can be compliant with regulatory and certification controls. Many material formulations to choose from, means we can typically find the right hydrogel to fit the specific electrical and application requirements.

We’ll continue our interview with our Medical Wearable Device FAE in an upcoming post!

What is Functional Display Testing?

Automated Display Testing:

Manual Display Testing:

In the final blog of our three-part series on technical printing, we will discuss the qualification procedures that technical printing projects endure.

In the last blog, we described the five phases of development for technical printing projects. Once that process is complete and stable, the project goes through qualification procedures as it moves on to production. Boyd carefully applies these procedures with technical printing projects, especially those belonging to highly regulated industries such as aerospace and medical.

There are three qualifications that projects must pass during production to be validated as parts ready to sell:

Installation Qualification (IQ)

Correct installation of machinery is vital because if the equipment isn’t properly installed, the parts it produces won’t be viable. IQ is typically conducted for new pieces of equipment purchased for a particular job. This involves testing the equipment and understanding the ins and outs of how it works. One of the most important factors when conducting IQ is learning the equipment’s variability when being used so we know the accuracy of the machine. With technical printing projects, only so much variability is allowed, and the variance of the equipment used must be carefully considered during production. If the piece of equipment has been used before, past qualification tests can be referenced.

Operation Qualification (OQ)

This process is to ensure that variables and critical operational parameters are held constant throughout production. In the previous blog, we described the initial development process that technical printing projects go through when moving from concept to production. OQ is all about understanding variability in our operation processes and how to maintain consistency during large-scale production. This is essentially development on the production level, requiring testing of many variables to gain a better understanding.

Since technically printed parts belong to pieces of equipment like medical devices, many variables must be controlled strictly, such as drying temperature, ink dispensing, ink thickness, and substrate materials. During OQ, the parameter windows are set with a minimum and maximum level of variances allowed, and it is critical to stay within these throughout production. For example, once we know the optimal temperature at which the ink will cure, the optimal thickness of the ink, and which substrate material is best for the ink to adhere to, we can move forward with production knowing the variables will be held constant at the appropriate level.

Production Qualification (PQ)

Production qualification is testing our production processes and the materials used when we manufacture parts (our suppliers’ control parameters). Since technically printed parts belong to highly regulated industries, we must make sure the substrates, dielectrics, carbons, silvers, and other materials are without defect and that our production processes are keeping the many variables in the middle of their parameter window. This process is done by doing three different runs/setups with different lots of materials during initial production. Once the parts are produced, each lot is examined to make sure it falls within the tight parameter windows. If it doesn’t, a root-cause analysis is conducted to determine whether the failure was due to poor materials, an issue with production setup, or another factor. This process is a final review that ensures that by the time the part is completed, it will be ready for the customer.

Since technically printed parts belong to highly regulated industries, they often go through this process when initially setting up for production. Boyd employs an expert team of quality control inspectors and quality engineers and utilizes IQ, OQ, PQ processes to ensure quality and repeatability throughout production.

To learn more about technical printing, check out the other blogs from this series:

• What is technical printing?
• Technical printing: development

For technical printing projects, Boyd provides support from development all the way to production.

This blog is the second in our series on technical printing. In our first blog, we gave an in-depth description of what technical printing is. In this blog, we will talk about how technical printing projects go from development to production.

How are technical printing projects started? At Boyd, technical printing projects start in our development department where the design is inspected, reviewed, and tested. The goal is to produce development part designs and quickly determine if the part is manufacturable. Our printing team will provide design considerations and test reports until a conclusion is drawn. Once a batch of parts has a high yield per volume and a high success rate, the project can move onto full production.

Phases of Technical Printing Projects

There are five phases that technical printing projects go through during development before they can move on to full-scale production, each with specific operations. These phases are particular to technical printing projects only because of the high level of scrutiny required in development.

Phase 1: Ideation

Ideation is an ongoing conversation between the customer and Boyd to identify the areas of the highest design risk. This allows both parties to define steps to test design assumptions and evaluate potential design and material solutions to help build confidence about the known challenges.

Phase 2: Risk Mitigation

The Risk Mitigation phase is used to validate material stability and printability, explore material handling and registration options, review curing processes, and establish a planned production approach. Defining the risks and challenges that are likely to occur allows for a plan to be made accordingly. All challenges must be addressed with care as technical printed parts require much tighter tolerances.

Phase 3: Low-Volume Functional Prototyping

Low-volume prototyping is used to create functional printed parts using the materials and preliminary product design planned for use during full volume production. This may take several rounds of prototype layouts and testing until a high yield success rate is achieved. With technical printing, projects in this phase become more device-specific and are outside of typical production, development, and industry standards.

Phase 4: Production Development Prototyping

With a suitable design identified, Boyd will work on transitioning into production manufacturing development. Larger quantities of parts will be printed and evaluated, with the goal of meeting customer specifications. Technical printing requires more rigid quality standards and process control, which is why Boyd implements such rigorous production reviews.

Phase 5: Production Validation

Once the parts have passed production development prototyping, the project is handed to a production team and design engineer to apply to production volume quantities.

Boyd’s expertise and strict quality systems allow us to work in these highly regulated spaces and gives our clients confidence in the parts we produce for them. In our next blog, we’ll be going over the qualification procedures for a technical printing project.

Ready to start your technical printing project? Contact Boyd to get started!

Considerations for Making a Cold Plate Specifically for Your Application

Cold Plate Technologies

Normalized Performance Curves

Channeled Cold Plates

Key Thermal Considerations During Liquid Cold Plate Design

Cold Plate Thermal Specifications

In addition to four types of cold plate technologies, there are also four scenarios of thermal requirements, which are listed below:

• Uniform Heat Flux, Fixed Flow Rate, 1 Maximum Pressure Drop, 1 Maximum Surface Temperature – With thermal scenario one, there is uniform input heat flux, a fixed flow rate, one specified maximum pressure drop that is limited at a fixed flow rate, and one specified maximum surface temperature where the surface temperature does not need to be uniform.
• Same as 1, but Non-Uniform Heat Flux – Thermal scenario two has the same specifications as scenario one, but heat loads vary instead of being uniform. The heat loads are concentrated in several locations under components or under specific areas
• Same as 1, but Surface Temperature Maximum Varies – Thermal scenario three also has the same specifications as scenario one, but thermal scenario three has specified maximum surface temperatures that vary across the cold plate, usually at the individual components.
• Same as 1, 2, or 3, but Surface Temperature Uniformity Required – With thermal scenario four, the thermal specifications may be the same as with thermal scenarios one, two, or three, but with the additional requirement that the maximum surface temperature must be uniform across the entire cold plate or under specific components. For example, if there are two types of components mounted on the cold plate, each component type may require temperature uniformity of the common components, but the two types may have different maximum surface temperatures.

Cold plate scenarios 2 and 3 are the ones most commonly encountered in custom cold plate design. Scenarios 1 through 4 are listed in order of increasing complexity and cost.

When designing custom cold plates to any specification, the logical steps most thermal experts take are defining the thermal map, generating the liquid circuiting concept, calculating temperature rise and pressure drop, and rerouting the liquid circuit if necessary.

Defining the Thermal Map

With several possible thermal scenarios, step one in custom cold plate design is to define the thermal map in detail. To create a thermal map, an engineer needs the dimensions, locations, and heat loads of the components to be cooled. The maximum allowable cold plate surface temperature(s); the coolant composition, its flow rate, and inlet temperature; and available pressure drop are needed as well. Also, heat flux must be calculated for each component which includes thermal spreading, if necessary.

Key Thermal Considerations During Liquid Cold Plate Design

Generating the Liquid Circuit Concept

The next step is to generate the first iteration on a liquid circuit concept. The liquid circuit must provide the required performance to cool the component with the highest heat flux and each component after it on the liquid circuit. In addition, it must do so with the specified flow rate and with an acceptable pressure drop. Sometimes techniques such as uneven widths of liquid series passes, different fin densities under individual components, and varying fin heights and types can be used to satisfy the competing requirements of performance and pressure drop. The fin’s geometry and height determine the “fin efficiency”, or how well it transfers heat to the liquid.

Sometimes the shape of high heat flux components (e.g. – a large round footprint) requires a change from the natural uniform flow distribution over the pass width to force non-uniformity, which can be achieved by using different lengths of fin or different fin densities over the pass width. Before the next component, some liquid equalizing pools (i.e. – mixing pools) should be designed in. Another fluid distribution challenge is the need for islands in the fluid path to accommodate component mounting. Any complication mentioned above can increase the cost of the cold plate due to the additional number of fin pieces, multiple depths in a cavity, multiple fin-forming equipment set-ups, and EDM cutting needed.

Calculating Temperature and Pressure Drop (Detailed Design Stage)

After the liquid circuit concept is outlined, the thermal map should be verified by calculating the maximum surface temperature under each component and calculating the total pressure drop. All the critical thermal areas must be modeled. If any one of the requirements is not met, the liquid circuits must be reworked and the calculations rerun.

Rerouting the Liquid Circuit

If the cold plate requires a varying maximum surface temperature (as in thermal scenario three) and normal liquid circuiting does not meet the specifications, the liquid circuit should be rerouted to deliver the coolest liquid to critical devices first or to by-pass part of the liquid directly to these components.

Temperature Uniformity

If the cold plate requirements specify maximum surface temperatures and temperature uniformity as in thermal scenario four, the design process is even more complex. The simplest solution to provide uniformity of maximum surface temperatures of identical components is to position the components on similar points of similar parallel liquid passages. The result should be a circuit that delivers liquid with a common temperature at sufficient flow rates to these components. Another technique that is used to provide a more uniform surface temperature across the entire cold plate is to use a counterflow arrangement (Figure 2). In a number of parallel channels, on a surface or on both sides of the plate, each second channel has flow in the opposite direction. For a one-side loaded or very thin cold plate, such an approach may significantly reduce surface temperature gradient. A similar effect may be delivered by organizing two separate layers of liquid.

Reducing Complexity & Costs

Certain thermal or mechanical requirements may force an illogical pass of the liquid circuit, resulting in greater complexity and a higher cost cold plate. For example, applications frequently have predetermined mounting hole locations that the liquid circuit must navigate around and/or components and fluid inlet and outlet locations that are fixed, significantly limiting the options for the liquid circuit. Generally, the more flexible the design is, the easier the cold plate will be to engineer and the more savings you’ll realize. By working closely with a printed circuit board designer or electrical engineer, the thermal engineer can provide input on the spacing and positioning of components to ensure they are designed with electrical as well as thermal requirements in mind. This may significantly simplify the cold plate design and reduce cost. For more information on cold plate costs please see our application note “Cold Plate Manufacturing Cost Drivers”.

It’s important to understand the various design techniques that allow a custom cold plate solution to meet the most challenging thermal and mechanical requirements. With thousands of permutations for a custom cold plate design, skilled engineering is key. Flexibility with the location of inlets and outlets, proper fluid circuit routing, and the use of fin or channels can help to create a thermal solution that provides great value for the application. As heat loads become more and more concentrated and the space allocated for cooling becomes smaller and smaller, custom cold plates will be used more and more to meet applications’ unique liquid cooling needs. Aavid, Thermal Division of Boyd Corporation has decades of experience designing and manufacturing custom cold plates for printed circuit boards and other electronics and ensuring their high thermal performance requirements and cost limits are met or exceeded.

Learn more about our different Liquid Cold Plate solutions in our Liquid Cold Plate Section.

Gathering Critical Device Data

Finding how much heat your electronic device dissipates and how to calculate maximum case temperature can be difficult if you’re not sure what you’re looking for. But determining the amount of heat a device dissipates is one of the first and most critical steps to developing the right thermal management solution.

The device you are using in your application will typically have an extensive datasheet that accompanies your purchase or is available from the manufacturer. Most electronic device manufacturers make this information freely available to customers or prospective customers. However, sometimes you may need to hunt for information. You usually can find it from either the manufacturer or the vendor you purchased your devices from.

Key Datasheet Terms

As these datasheets are often written with the electrical engineer as the primary user; critical thermal information might not be easy to find. In some cases, figuring out what your datasheet is saying can be difficult as different manufacturers may represent the same information in different formats or locations. In case you still can’t find these values after scouring the table of contents or all the sections, reach out to the device manufacturer as these are important values to have before your start designing.

Calculating Max Case Temperature

In order to calculate your maximum case temperature, first multiply the amount of heat the device dissipates by the junction-to-case thermal resistance to get the temperature rise from junction to case. Then subtract this temperature rise from the maximum junction temperature to get the maximum case temperature.

Tjunction-max – (Ɵjunction-to-case*Pdissipated) = Tcase-max

This calculation may not always so straightforward, as in the case of Thermoelectric Coolers (TECs) or Thermoelectric Devices (TEDs). Because they have a “hot side” and a “cold side,” it may take a couple of calculations to determine how your device handles heat on both sides.

Next Steps in Thermal Management Design

If you need assistance, please don’t hesitate to contact our Engineering Team. They’ve had extensive experience in reading these types of datasheets and can help you design the right solution for you.