Mentor Blogs

In the royal family of thermal IC package modelling types, a detailed model is King. All critical 3D geometry is modelled explicitly, no abstraction into a thermal resistor equivalent model, no hiding all the proprietary design information inside either. Pros and cons of detailed models I covered a few years ago in this blog. Packaged ICs are complex, constructed of many parts, with many different material … Read More

Electronics Cooling, calibration, Package Model, T3ster

On the sliding scale of thermal component model representation king of all is a ‘detailed’ model. A 3D definition of all of the internal construction geometry and material properties does away with any of the accuracy inconsistency issues associated with the derived CTM (thermal resistor network type) approach. Despite the fact that all models are wrong a detailed model representation of a package … Read More

Detailed, Electronics Cooling, Component, Thermal Resistor, Package Model

Like a river this blog series is slowing down due to its increased width and depth, that and a lot of travel on my part. So, let’s get it back on track! The previous blog focussed on the relatively well known 2 resistor compact thermal model (CTM) method, its strengths (simple to measure and describe) and its deficiencies (unconfirmed and inconsistent accuracy for different package styles and operating … Read More

Thermal Resistor, Accuracy, BCI, 2R, Package Model, Delphi, Electronics Cooling

The next two parts in this series focus on the thermal model representations of electronic objects. The first being packages, or should that be components, or chips? From a mechanical analysis perspective they're the things that are plonked onto a PCB that get hot. These things do clever electrical stuff, or should that be electronic stuff? If you haven't already guessed I'm a mechanical engineer with … Read More

Package Model, Electronics Cooling