|
When VT Miltope took on the challenge of creating its new
generation of ultra-rugged military laptops, one of the first tools
they jumped to was Coolit's CFD program. With a powerful Intel
chipset, and full slate of
MIL-STD-810F environmental requirements--including 60C ambient
operating temperature and sealing from water, sand, and dust--Coolit
proved the laptop's chips could be cooled effectively.
The TSC V3-GM45 Rugged Laptop Computer (RLC) is used by the Army
in portable configurations and mounted in military vehicles
for strategic field applications. It features a dual heat-pipe-based
Remote Heat Exchanger (RHE) and waterproof blower which are partially
open to the environment while the rest of the circuit boards and
components are sealed within the main chassis.
Coolit demonstrated that the blower and RHE, like personal body
guards, usher heat away from the 35W CPU and 13W GMCH chips, keeping
die temperatures well within specifications. Coolit also showed
that the memory modules were
adequately cooled by using integral heat spreaders that conduct heat
into an access door in the magnesium chassis.
Heat pipes were modeled in Coolit as very high heat flux solid
cores wrapped with thin copper plate elements. RHE fin geometry was
quickly modeled with the clone feature. Detailed flip-chip FCBGA
models were created easily for the CPU and GMCH based on
manufacturer's parameters. The blower's impedance curve was entered
along with inlet and exhaust filter foam characteristics, and all
the other chassis details were rapidly created using readily
available Coolit objects.
VT Miltope performed Coolit modeling very early in the design
stages when it was not possible to build prototypes because real
hardware such as circuit boards, RHE, and chassis components were
not yet available. Much later, when real hardware was assembled,
the component temperatures were measured with thermocouples under
various intensive application heat loads. Measured values proved
to be within a maximum of 3C of those predicted
by Coolit.
|
