Material

The most common heat sink materials are aluminium alloys. Aluminium alloy 1050A has one of the higher thermal conductivity values at 229 W/m•K but is mechanically soft. Aluminium alloys 6060 and 6063 are commonly used, with thermal conductivity values of 166 and 201 W/m•K, respectively. The values depend on the temper of the alloy.

Copper has around twice the conductivity of aluminium, but is three times as dense and, depending on the market, around four to six times more expensive than aluminium. Aluminium can be extruded, but copper can not. Copper heat sinks are machined and skived. Another method of manufacture is to solder the fins into the heat sink base.

Diamond is another heat sink material, and its thermal conductivity of 2000 W/m•K exceeds copper five-fold. In contrast to metals, where heat is conducted by delocalized electrons, lattice vibrations are responsible for a diamond's very high thermal conductivity. For thermal management applications, the outstanding thermal conductivity and diffusivity of a diamond are essential. Nowadays synthetic diamond is used as submounts for high-power integrated circuits and laser diodes.

ABL specialises in the supply of aluminium heatsinks and has often found this to be the perfect choice of material to balance cost, availability and heatsink performance.

Composite materials can be used. Examples are a copper-tungsten pseudo alloy, AlSiC (silicon carbide in the aluminium matrix), Dymalloy (diamond in copper-silver alloy matrix), and E-Material (beryllium oxide in beryllium matrix). Such materials are often used as substrates for chips, as their thermal expansion coefficient can be matched to ceramics and semiconductors.