Heat Pipe Production Guidelines

When choosing copper heat pipe vendors, procurement and engineering teams should be familiar with best-in-class production practices for delivering products of high quality and long life. This is especially critical for applications designed for 10+ years of service and those subject to mission-critical/harsh conditions.

Raw Material Quality: Copper tubing and sheets used for heat pipes and vapor chambers should be oxygen-free to ensure resilience by preventing brittleness, leakage, and outgassing – critical for copper destined for a hydrogen-sintering furnace.

Machinery Calibration: Ensure the supplier regularly calibrates critical machinery/devices, like ultrasonic cleaners, hydrogen furnaces, and CMM machines, to meet ISO standards, ensuring consistent quality and performance.

First Article Testing: Suppliers should validate performance under maximum application power as a function of temperature and ensure device integrity, durability, and vacuum seal reliability.

100% Mass Production Testing: Vendors should check 100% of heat pipes and vapor chambers during mass production, especially where applications are mission critical or have an expected service life of more than 10 years.

Assumed in this summary: Parts have been optimized for manufacturability and are used within pre-defined operating parameters.