Demonstration of a Modular Reconfigurable Thermal Management System for SIGINT/EW Power Electronics

As Army signal intelligence (SIGINT) and electronic warfare (EW) continue to evolve, significant improvements in thermal technologies at the device level have provided higher heat flux dissipation. System integrators are hesitant to utilize these advanced cooling technologies because they require customized system-level thermal management solutions. Mainstream proposes a modular reconfigurable thermal management system (MR-TMS) that can acquire heat from both air-cooled and liquid-cooled SIGINT/EW components. It is expandable to satisfy future phase-change-cooled electronics. The concept is applicable to both open-frame rack-mount systems and environmentally-sealed enclosures. The system can reject heat to vehicle air or be integrated with the vehicle cooling system. In Phase I, Mainstream will design four modular cooling units and fabricate one cooling module for an environmentally-sealed enclosure. System demonstrations will be performed with representative loads for existing air-cooled, existing liquid-cooled, and future phase-change-cooled modules. In the Phase I Option, Mainstream will fabricate two additional cooling modules and demonstrate the ability of the TMS to be reconfigured. In Phase II, Mainstream will further optimize the cooling system and deliver a production-version system. The production-version system will proceed directly to Mil-Std First Article Tests (FAT) in Phase III without any additional development or “tool up” funds.