By Josh Perry, Editor
[email protected]

Advanced Cooling Technologies, Inc. (ACT) recently announced that it had received approval from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office for its Constant Conductance Heat Pipe (CCHP) Assembly for High Heat Flux (U.S. Patent 9,952,000).

Copper/water heat pipes can be embedded in an axial groove CCHP condenser to spread heat and connect to a remote heat spreader. (Advanced Cooling Technologies, Inc.)

The patent, according to the announcement, features copper/water heat pipes embedded in the flanges of aluminum/ammonia CCHP, which enhances the performance of the both the aluminum evaporator and condenser up to as much as 50 W/cm² and spreads the heat to the CCHP with a manageable level of 15 W/cm².

Jens Weyant, ACT’s Defense/Aerospace Products Group Manager, said in the press release, “For years, we have been supplying our spacecraft customers with CCHPs, which can accept heat fluxes of up to 10-15 W/cm².  This has become a serious constraint, as electronic devices continue to increase in power and shrink in size.  By combining CCHPs with copper/water heat pipes, we can now provide products that can handle heat fluxes of more than 50W/cm². Our customers are very excited about this new capability.”

One of the researchers responsible for this breakthrough is Dr. Mohammed Ababneh, who was featured in an article from his alma mater, the University of Cincinnati. He called the project a “revolution” for heat pipe applications in spacecraft.

The article explained, “To test the capabilities of the recently developed heat pipes, the group teamed up with Lockheed Martin. On top of showing the new heat pipes’ ability to withstand three times the heat of traditional pipes, the tests at ACT and Lockheed Martin showed that these new heat pipes perform efficiently, consistently and reliably and are adaptable to increased temperatures.”

Learn more at https://1-act.com/news/acts-new-patent-expands-its-spacecraft-thermal-control-solution-offerings.