Peristaltic Pump Electronics Thermal Design
with FloTHERM XT
Original Watson-Marlow design as evaluated by IC Blue
Watson-Marlow Fluid Technology Group produce a range of chemical metering pumps. Their Qdos pumps are specified to replace diaphragm and other designs of metering pump as a result of their precision flow rates and significantly lower maintenance costs when handling abrasive or corrosive fluids. The success of these pumps and their technology makes them the ideal choice for rugged applications.
One such application for Qdos pumps is metering chemical coatings on to seeds, with the pump mounted on the seed planter towed behind a tractor. Seed treatment is now common practice for agriculture and horticulture industries, where the thick fluid coating may contain growth promoters, inert carriers or fertilizers, as well as antimicrobial or antifungal treatments.
The requirement to deploy Qdos pumps externally has introduced some new design complexity. As all Watson-Marlow pumps are mains powered, the mains powered 48V 200W internal Switched Mode Power Supply Unit (SMPSU) had to be replaced by a 12/24V DC input power supply.
PADS, discovering that the heatsink did not work well, with excessive temperatures shown on the components, as well as being prohibitively expensive to machine, requiring a large number of fins.
Based on the success of the evaluation work by IC Blue, Watson-Marlow were able to make a business case to purchase FloTHERM XT for PADS to be used by their own development team. The purchasing decision was used to great effect, enabling a completely redesigned heatsink utilising dual 30mm fans and a standard heatsink extrusion, with the DC power supply meeting the cost and size target, as well as matching the original mains SMPSU.
Throughout this development work, Watson-Marlow were able to take component placement, board design and power data, directly from PADS into FloTHERM XT in a smooth and efficient manner. As a result, FloTHERM XT simulations were fully synchronized with the PCB layout and circuit design, without thermal risks. Watson-Marlow also use PTC Creo for their mechanical design, and were able to read native Creo geometry directly into FloTHERM XT for PADS, allowing other designs of heatsink to be incorporated
directly and used without modification or further simplification.
With this workflow, Watson-Marlow used FloTHERM XT for PADS to undertake many further investigations, re-designing the heatsink to a form that can be cast to save costs over the extruded part.
Fujifilm Frontloads Camera Design with FloTHERM
Our department focuses on the development of cameras with high performance and high quality, to preserve the culture of photography and to develop imaging technology. The team I belong to develops the elemental technology of such cameras and lenses and supports the business by running simulations. I have been involved in thermal design by predicting temperature with simulation tools ever since the first “X-100” of Fujifilm’s X digital camera series. Now simulation technologies are essential for product development today.
Modern digital cameras, like Fujifilm’s X-Pro 2 are developed to dissipate the minimum amount of heat as form factors shrink. Excessive heat can increase the size and weight of the cooling solution, preventing
miniaturization. It is associated with the concept of poor design by the consumer, as the design can appear to have “regressed” back to an earlier bulkier form factor. It also requires the use of higher-cost parts, adding cost to the product, further reducing its competitiveness.
Robert Bosch India Drives ECUTemperatures Down
FloTHERM Model of ECU showing Finned Housing
Modern cars can contain upwards of 100 Electronic Control Units (ECUs) so the reliability of these units is critical to the reliability of the vehicle. ECUs can be found throughout a vehicle, often in hot, harsh environments, yet component temperatures must be kept within acceptable limits even when the ambient temperature is high, making optimizing their thermal performance a key element of the design challenge.
For this, Robert Bosch Engineering and Business Solutions needed a fast, accurate and robust simulation tool they could depend on, to explore different design options quickly and effectively, including the transient response to a time-varying power load, so they turned to Mentor Graphics’ FloTHERM.