The Reliability of Thermoelectric Coolers (III)

c) In order to avoid TECs losing effect due to obvious mechanical vibration, do not place any large mass device without support on the cold end of TECs. When involving lass mass device, it’s better to use chucking to fix the TECs between heat sinks and the object. Or place the device on a cold plate that can be media at first. At this time, damping screws can effectively increase the shear strength of the whole mechanical system.

d) The TECs shall insulate from moisture in the air in order to avoid reduction in its performance or electrochemical corrosion to the TECs. When the temperature reaches below dew points, effective sealing protection shall be installed in order to prevent moisture entering into TECs. The protection layer shall be installed around TECs between heat sink and the object. Electron level RTV silica gel can be directly used as the protection layer of the TECs.

e) If the working conditions of TECs is involved in thermal cycle or large temperature change, soldering or epoxy resin installation methods are not recommended. That’s because rigid connection is needed in these two methods, which will cause large thermal stress, resulting in TECs losing effect ahead of time, unless thermal expansion coefficient of all the components are very close. At this situation, it’s recommend to use installation materials like thermal conductive silicone, graphite flake, etc.

Moreover, temperature control method will affect the reliability of TECs. It’s suggested to use linear or equal proportion temperature control method, not  ON/OFF.

If you want to know more, please feel free to contact us.

Our web site is http://www.analogtechnologies.com/