Abstract:

With the increasing demand for the cooling of electronic chips, the micro heat pipe with the sintered wick has become an ideal heat radiator. In order to accurately determine the forming temperature and time of the sintered wick and to offer methods for the fixation and extraction of the mandrel as well as the infilling of copper powders, this paper analyzes the forming mechanism of copper powders in the wick and investigates the manufacturing process of the capillary structure of the sintered wick in the micro heat pipe. The results indicate that, by the proposed manufacturing process, the wicks sintered at 900 -950 ℃ for 30 - 60 min are of well-proportioned distribution, good symmetry, high production efficiency and low production cost, and that micro heat pipes fabricated with such sintered wicks are of good heat transfer performance.

Key words: micro heat pipe, wick, forming mechanism, sintering, manufacturing process