Effect of Plenum Shape on Thermohydraulic Performance of Microchannel Heat Sink

Heat sinks, cooled by flowing fluid in the microchannels fabricated upon them, successfully proved effective cooling solution in electronic components. The entire thermal output of such a heat sink depends upon the characteristics of fluid flowing in the channels and the plenums placed subsequently at inlet and outlet positions. The flow phenomena got influenced by channel aspect ratio, plenum aspect ratio and flow arrangements in the plenums placed at inlet and outlet positions. In the present study, an experimental and computational investigation has been performed to depict how the heat transfer and pressure drop attributes vary with different plenum shapes under different flow rates and heat inputs in microchannel heat sink (MCHS). Test runs were performed by maintaining three constant heat inputs, 50 W, 100 W and 150 W in the range 221 ≤ Re ≤ 398.