Experimental investigation of manifold microchannel heat sink structures on flow and heat transfer characteristics

With the continuous increase in heat flux of electronic devices, developing efficient cooling solutions has become an urgent need. The manifold microchannel heat sink has gained significant research attention due to its compact structure and excellent heat transfer performance. Current studies mainly focus on optimizing single configurations, while systematic comparisons of different structures under various operating conditions are lacking. To clarify the advantages and disadvantages of different microchannel configurations across flow rate ranges and to provide guidance for the selection and design of high-performance manifold microchannel heat sinks, this study designed and constructed a flow-visualization experimental setup to investigate the flow and heat transfer characteristics of conventional rectangular manifold microchannel heat sink, parallel slit manifold microchannel heat sink and staggered fin manifold microchannel heat sink. The experiments employed deionized water as the working fluid under a constant heating power of 600 W, with the inlet temperature maintained at 298 K and flow rates varying from 100 to 430 g/min. The results show that below 145 g/min, the staggered fin manifold microchannel exhibits the lowest pressure drop, approximately 40% lower than that of the conventional rectangular type. Above 145 g/min, the conventional rectangular manifold microchannel shows the lowest pressure drop. In the flow rate range of 100–130 g/min, the average temperatures of the heated surface for all three types are quite similar, while the maximum surface temperatures from low to high are: conventional rectangular, parallel slit, and staggered fin manifold microchannel. Between 145 g/min and 310 g/min, the staggered fin configuration provides the best cooling performance, reducing the temperature by about 5 K compared to the conventional rectangular type. Beyond 370 g/min, the parallel slit manifold microchannel demonstrates the most superior heat transfer performance, with a temperature reduction of 0.4 K.