Flow-through Porous Finned Heat Sinks with Helmholtz Resonators for Combined Heat Dissipation and Tonal as well as Broadband Noise Reduction

In convective cooling heat sinks, fans are used to create the flow, which generates noise. Using a separate device for noise reduction would increase the system's overall size. Combining noise-reducing functionality with a heat sink is desired in many space-constrained applications. Fan noise typically contains both tonal and broadband frequency components. Metal foam heat sinks can be effectively used for broadband noise reduction, especially at mid and high frequencies, and heat dissipation in the same volume. Corrugated metal foam heat sinks or porous finned heat sinks show better heat transfer performance and better noise reduction at lower pressure drops than the block foam geometry. Helmholtz resonator is a classical acoustic device that can address the low-frequency tonal noise centered at the natural frequency of the Helmholtz resonator. This study involves the experimental investigation of corrugated periodic foam heat sink geometry for thermal and acoustic performance. Also, to address tonal low-frequency fan noise, the acoustic performance of the Helmholtz resonator combined with a corrugated periodic foam heat sink is experimentally studied.