Feasibility and design study of a frictionless air mover for thermal management of electronics

摘要

A frictionless air mover concept is introduced in this paper. As opposed to a piezoelectric driven fan, the air mover is based on a flexible blade whose vibration is driven by means of a magnetic field. The blade is based on a polymer material. The paper presents the results of a feasibility analysis and an on-going comprehensive design study. The performance of the prototype amounted to 65% of a comparable piezoelectric fan. To enhance the performance, two different blade materials were investigated, as well as the influence of the coil shape and value. A further goal is to reduce the size and to investigate the influence of a casing. The design study resulted in a prototype of size of 50 x 14 x 35 mm~2 including a casing. The performance could be doubled, to attain a volumetric flow rate of V ~14 l/min and a static pressure of p_(stat) = 3 Pa.