Temperature Distribution in Flux Channels with Discrete Contact Boundary Conditions

An analytical approach for the thermal behavior of two-dimensional rectangular flux channels with arbitrary boundary conditions on the source plane is presented. The boundary condition along the source plane can be a combination of the first kind boundary condition (Dirichlet or prescribed temperature) and the second kind boundary condition (Neumann or prescribed heat flux). To model the boundary conditions along the source plane, the method of least squares is used. The proposed solution is in the form of Fourier series expansion and can be applied to both symmetrical and non-symmetrical channels. This method is more general than other approaches and there is no need to use equivalent heat flux distributions to model isothermal heat sources. The general approach for obtaining the multidimensional temperature profile in flux channels and the advantages of the least-square method is discussed. The proposed solution can be used to calculate the temperature at any specified point in the flux channel. Two case studies are presented. The first case study is a flux channel with five discretely specified contact temperatures along the source plane. The second case study has both of the first kind and second kind boundary conditions on the source plane. The analytical results for both systems are compared with finite element method using a commercial software package. It is shown that the proposed approach can precisely model the temperature profile over the flux channel.