Modeling and simulation of power electronic modules with microchannel coolers for thermo-mechanical performance

This paper investigated the thermo-mechanical performance of microchannel-based technology to actively cool high power electronic modules, of which the power loss of the module has reached as high as 550 watts. Finite element analysis (FEA) method was used to model and simulate the performance of insulated gate bipolar transistor (IGBT) modules. Thermal and mechanical performances of power electronic modules with and without microchannel were analyzed and compared. Residual stress caused by reflow soldering process and operating stress considering the residual stress in previous process were studied for the first time, in which plastic behavior of soft solder and copper were taken into account. Anand viscoplasticity constitutive model was used to describe the soft solder behavior in the assembly process. The Chaboche nonlinear kinematic hardening model for the copper was considered as well. Three dimensional temperature and stress distributions were presented, based on the optimization design by adjusting the thickness of each layer to reduce the operating stress and therefore extend the lifetime of the module.