Electronical packaging of a high power device operating in geo orbit

It is known that thermal design engineers have difficulties in temperature control of GEO (Geostationary Equatorial Orbits) satellites, compared to other systems operating in ground applications due to harsh space environment. Electronic packaging is an essential discipline especially when high thermal loads together with other mechanical requirements need to be optimized. In most of the design, thermal management or cooling methods draw the main design path for the unit. In this study, there are eleven identical PCB´s and cold plates in an electronic box. The main focus of this article is the thermal optimization of the cold plates to obtain a light and high conductive cold plate by considering all mechanical design requirements. In order to achieve this goal, the thermal unknowns in the design are reduced by improving mechanical design and production technique as much as possible. Thermal and structural analyses (Power Spectral Density- PSD) have been carried out to decide and check the mechanical requirements. All thermal and structural analyses have been carried out with finite element methods (FEM). The results show that 1.9 kg lighter cold plates can be achieved by using Annealed Pyrolytic Graphite (APG) with the same thermal performance of copper