My Quark Heatsink

[jhautz]

OK I finally got sick of riding the edge of thermaling my quark all the time so I designed up a simple heat sink that mounts to the motor mount bracket of either the stock emaxx transmission or the gmaxx motor mount. I designed it in solidworks and had the shop at work machine it up for me in one of the cnc mills. Its flat on one side for mounting to the flat back of the quark and has radiator fins and screw holes for mounting (2) 5V 40mm fans. I mounted the quark to it using the termal paste they use for computer chips.

Hope this works....

Heres a few pics.

The mount by itself:




With 2 fans mounted:



Mounted up in my e-revo with the quark:

That is beautiful, very professional I like how the heat sink is also the mount for the ESC. What is weird is that it looks similar to the one I just put together for my controller. Especially with the twin fans. I used some memory card heat sinks that cut up to fit the bottom. Then used thermal adhesive to bond them to the ESC. I love when I plug it in. It has a nice hum to it. I keep meaning to post some pixs of it. Maybe I'll get the camera out.

[Serum]

Freaking sexy!!

Does the heat comes from the bottom? How much does it differ, temperature wise?

[HotnCold]

Definately looks good - the only question is - being that the fans are mounted to the heatsink - if you were to jump or flip - i wonder how durable the fans will be - the blades pop off kinda easily... Any feedback would be awesome - Maybe ill try to make one sorta kinda like it - maybe - Sweet none the less. Now i just have to find someone with a cnc machine...:005:

[Nick]

Very nice. Great work!

[Mike.L]

wow! nice sink dude, but will that really do anything, heat rises so really the botom of the e.s.c will be cool. Imo?

[coolhandcountry]

Let us know how much of a difference it makes on cooling.

The bottom of my Quark is resting on my chassis (Lightning Stadium) and it acts as a huge heatsink. Works brilliantly. The top of the quark is plastic, so only the sides and bottom are metal to put a heatsink on.

[jhautz]

Originally Posted by Mike.L

wow! nice sink dude, but will that really do anything, heat rises so really the botom of the e.s.c will be cool. Imo?

Long Answer:

When you say heat rises... That’s true if you are talking about heat in air. When you heat air it expands and becomes less dense and rises above cooler more dense air. Air is gas. It has very low density and the effect of heat has a large relative effect. In a material like aluminum, it has very high density and very high thermal conductivity. Heat will travel any direction through it very well. This is why it is frequently used as a heat sink.

The fets are attached to the bottom of the aluminum quark case and the case is designed to be the heat sink. Unfortunately it doesn't quite have enough mass and surface area to effectively absorb and dissipate the heat generated by the fets. All I did was attach a larger material mass to the point where the heat is generated so that it can conduct the heat away from the electronics. The heat sink then transfers the heat to the surrounding air. Because the rate at which heat is conducted to the air is much lower than the rate the aluminum can absorb the heat from the fets, fins are added to the back of the heat sink for no other reason than to increase the surface area of the aluminum so that effectively it has more air touching it. The fans simply move air over the surface of the heat sink to get the hot air touching the heat sink away and replace it with cool air.


Short answer.... Yes. It should work well. I'm gonna test it out tonight and I'll let you know.

[Serum]

The fets are attached to the bottom of the aluminum quark case

You're sure?

[Gustav]

I wondered about just mounting the esc to an aluminium chassis with a thermal pad in between,should absorb a little shock and still conduct heat to the chassis.

[BrianG]

Originally Posted by Serum

You're sure?

Yep. I took the plastic cover and sides off and the ESC is made up of a couple layers of stacked boards (like the BK Warriors), but the bottom layer is attached to the case. You can do this too, but be careful because there is a small surface mount capacitor next to the LEDS that can get torn off if you aren't careful.

I've had great results with adding a heatsink as well. My temps went from 140F+ to 110F-115F depending on outside temps and driving.

[jhautz]

I didn't open mine up an check, but I read on another thread that this was the case. I believe it was Brian G that opened it up and reported the fets attached to the case w/ thermal epoxy. Also, RC-Monster Mike put a heat sink on his attached to back of the case and reported great success.



Edit: Oops... :010: Cross Post. Thanks Brian.

[Serum]

It would be more layers with the powerfetts then. (like the BK) wonder where the tempprobe is. let's hope it's on the hottest part.

[Procharged5.0]

Jhautz,

Great job on the heatsink! Any chance you could have one made for a fellow Chicagoan?

If not, I'll take a stab at making one for myself when time allows. Please let us know how much temps drop with the new heatsink system!

Once again, Great Job!