Thermo-mechanical analysis of thermoelectric modules

The present paper studies the thermo-mechanical performance of thermoelectric modules by utilizing the Finite Element Analysis FEA simulation software ANSYS. A typical type TEG device with 32 pairs of legs was constructed. Three different thickness for the pads with 100um, 500um, and 1000um were given for investigating the geometry effect. The thermo-electric results got well confirmed compared with analytical solution. The maximum Von Mises stress occurs on the contact surface between top pad and top substrate due to the large CTE mismatch between the copper pad and the AlN substrate, especially in the higher temperature case. This stress might lead to module failure and reduce the reliability.