Experimental testing of the thermal behaviour of spacecraft PCBs

Abstract

The main objective of this paper is the study of the thermal behaviour of spacecrafts PCB. Specifically, the work is focused on obtaining experimental data of the thermal contact resistance of a spacer in a PCB in therms of the joint tightening. It is carried out with three different experiments on a PCB: the study of the thermal contact resistance of an spacer, the thermal resistance of a via, and the thermal through plane resistance. A PCB is designed featuring these three different experiments, which are meant to be performed in a vacuum chamber, in order to recreate space conditions.