Electronics Cooling Toolset

The Electronics Cooling Toolset provides a simplified approach within Simcenter STAR-CCM+ to perform simulations of thermal management for electronics devices—from design to solution analysis.

The Electronics Cooling Toolset simplifies and speeds up the simulation setup of typical electronics cooling problems in Simcenter STAR-CCM+ by accessing a subset of features that are relevant to a thermal management simulation.

A key feature of the Electronics Cooling Toolset is the provision of QuickParts. QuickParts allow you to define the geometry, placement, and physics of components in an efficient and compact way. QuickParts are available for the most common components of an electronics device, such as PCBs, chips, heatsinks, or fans. Geometry templates enable you to build these components without requiring an external CAD tool. Additionally, interactive dimensioning and positioning features reduce the time spent on component design and layout. QuickPart libraries allow you to restore previously saved QuickParts.

For chips, the Electronics Cooling Toolset provides a compact thermal modeling approach. Compact thermal models (CTMs) represent the critical heat flow paths within chip packages using thermal resistor networks. CTMs do not resolve the internal volume of chip packages and thereby reduce computational costs for complex devices.

The user interface of the Electronics Cooling Toolset consists of several ordered nodes that you work through sequentially. Each node represents a specific stage in the workflow of setting up the simulation. In the background, the Electronics Cooling Toolset defines the models and parameters that are required for the analysis in the Simcenter STAR-CCM+ simulation tree.

You do not require a detailed knowledge of CFD or Simcenter STAR-CCM+ in order to use the tool. However, you still have access to the full functionality of Simcenter STAR-CCM+ at any stage if you want to modify your model or account for more complex scenarios.