ANSYS R18 Update - Cooling

ANSYS IcePak is ANSYS's electronics cooling solution.

This webinar will cover Release 18 enhancements to ANSYS IcePak's capabilities in printed circuit board electro-thermal analysis, chip thermal model (CTM) import and back annotation, MCAD workflow, meshing, solving, and high-performance computing (HPC), as well as ECAD handling, post-processing, and electronic component XML support for data exchange.

Towards the end of this presentation, I'll also introduce the upcoming ANSYS electronics desktop IcePak.

First, I'll go into the topic of IcePak enhancements in the area of printed circuit board electro-thermal analysis at Release 18. There were several enhancements in this area, including improvements in handling smaller footprints and higher power requirements, increases in current density leading to dual heating in traces, planes, and vias, and board-level reliability concerns.

ANSYS' printed circuit board multi-physics solution workflow addresses these three areas of reliability concerns.

The ANSYS PCB multi-physics workflow starts with an electrical DC analysis in ANSYS SIwave, which gives conductive losses in the board and a detailed picture of those conductive losses, layer by layer and spatially varying at each layer.

These conductive losses are then transferred into ANSYS ICEPAC, where a thermal analysis can be performed based on those losses. The result of this is a temperature map in the board.

This temperature map is then transferred back to the board, and a new SIwave DC voltage drop analysis can be performed. This new SIwave simulation can then transfer the new conductive losses into ICEPAC, and get a new temperature map. This process iterates until convergence.

Once thermal convergence is achieved, the analysis can move on to consider mechanical reliability. There are two options for the Printed Circuit Board Electrothermal Analysis part. The first option is launching the ICEPAC-SIwave coupling within SIwave itself.

Option two is launching the SIwave-ICEPAC coupling from within ICEPAC. Both options are fully automated and iterate to thermal convergence.

The key difference between the two is that the ICEPAC-SIwave coupling is a little more complex, but it gives more flexibility in building up the thermal environment. Now, I want to talk about the enhancements that were made at Release 18 for both of these options.

I'll spend some time on this, and then I'll move on to the other areas of enhancements. So, what I want to talk about today is the enhancements that were made at Release 18 for both of these options. I'll spend some time on this, and then I'll move on to the other areas of enhancements.

For option one, launching your electro-thermal coupling from within SIwave, there are several enhancements. In SIwave, you can click on the simulation tab and then the ICEPAC icon to begin setting up your thermal portion of your electro-thermal analysis.

The ICEPAC is now running, and the SIwave pre-watches the ICEPAC solver for you. The two power profile maps go from SIwave to ICEPAC, and the temperature maps go from ICEPAC to SIwave. The SIwave GUI workflow now has a tabbed panel that walks you through your thermal environment setup.

You can select thermal simulation type, either conduction or convection, and set up thermal boundary conditions accordingly. You can add components selectively and assign appropriate powers to them. There's also a filter option to reduce unnecessary components in your thermal simulation.

For option two, launching the SIwave-ICEPAC coupling from within ICEPAC, you have more flexibility in building up your thermal environment. You can include fans, enclosures, any combination of ICEPAC objects or mechanical CAD.

In summary, the enhancements at Release 18 for the PCB electro-thermal analysis capabilities include improved solver stability, spatial profile implementation for the layer-by-layer power dissipation maps, and the ability to create and open an ICEPAC project from SIwave.

Next, I want to give you some updates on enhancements for release 18 for the ICEPAC-based workflow. One area of improvement is in terms of usability. The macro that launches the electro-thermal analysis in ICEPAC now only requires pointing to the board in ICEPAC and the SIwave project file.

Speed and robustness improvements include the implementation of a spatial profile for the power dissipation map and the ability to offset or rotate boards from their original location. Temperatures are mapped back to SIwave accordingly.

The workflow now has support for multiple boards, and boards of the same setup can point to the same initial SIwave project.

Next, I want to talk about enhancements to ICEPAC's capabilities to handle the chip thermal model (CTM) and to back annotate temperatures to ANSYS's semiconductor tools, such as RedHawk. At release 18, ICEPAC can directly import the CTM that is generated by ANSYS RedHawk.

This allows you to perform a thermal-aware electron migration reliability analysis on the chip. Next, I want to talk about enhancements to ICEPAC's capabilities at R18 and its mechanical CAD workflow.

There's been significant enhancements in ICEPAC's capabilities to handle mechanical CAD data, thanks to its linking to SpaceClaim. Geometry, simplification, repair, and modification is significantly streamlined compared to ANSYS Design Modeler.

In SpaceClaim, you can auto-identify simple ICEPAC shapes and modify the ICEPAC object type. SpaceClaim now has the simplification levels, which were also a core feature in the Design Modeler CAD workflow to ICEPAC.

In summary, the enhancements at Release 18 for the ICEPAC-based workflow include usability improvements, speed and robustness improvements, support for multiple boards, and improved CTM handling.

Finally, I want to talk about enhancements in ICEPAC's capabilities in meshing, solving, and high-performance computing at Release 18. Meshing robustness was improved in the area of CAD models.

Additionally, in terms of solver enhancements, ICEPAC now includes the option to disable radiation in fluid zones.

The Krylov Reduced Order Model capability has seen some enhancements at Release 18. The key enhancement here is that the Krylov ROM now supports source objects, block objects, and groups as inputs. Improvements in ICEPAC's HPC performance at Release 18 are shown through a test case.

The highlights of this HPC test case include a desktop server with mechanical CAD, electrical CAD, about 700 objects, and a mesh with about 11 million cells.

In summary, the enhancements at Release 18 for ICEPAC's meshing, solving, and HPC capabilities include improved CAD model handling, the option to disable radiation in fluid zones, and enhancements to the Krylov Reduced Order Model capability. Thank you for your attention.