Performance Investigation of Partial Foam Cladded Pin Fins

Advances in electronic systems demand compact cooling structures that combine high thermal performance with low flow resistance. The partial incorporation of aluminum foam around pin fins offers a promising approach to enhance hydrothermal behavior while avoiding the excessive pressure losses associated with porous designs. Numerical simulations, validated against experimental measurements with deviations below 5% in pressure drop and 2.2% in base temperature, are conducted under laminar forced-air flow to investigate the effects of foam coverage and thickness. The cladding angle and outer diameter are varied between 90–180 degrees and 10–18 mm, respectively. Increasing either parameter improves heat removal through expanded surface area and stronger solid–fluid interaction, but also increases viscous losses. The configuration with 180-degree coverage and 18-millimeter thickness achieves the lowest base temperature (42.45 °C) but the highest pressure drop (12.57 Pa), whereas intermediate arrangements with 120-degree coverage and 15–18 mm thickness provide a favorable balance between cooling enhancement and flow resistance. When normalized by the volume of porous material, the results demonstrate that optimized partial cladding sustains high hydrothermal efficiency with substantially reduced material usage, offering an effective design strategy for advanced air-cooled electronic heat sinks.