Due to the increasing miniaturization of devices and the growing densities of power, the requirement for thermal management has become more significant than ever before with electronic devices. Micro-fin heat sinks offer a substantial increase in the area available to dissipate heat than traditional macro-fin heat sinks; however, precision manufacturing of these micro-fin features is a significant hurdle. In the experimental study of the machining of micro-fin heat sinks using a precision milling process. The selected workpiece material was aluminium alloy A6063 as it has high thermal conductivity, and is usually used in cooling systems for electronics. The experiments consisted of systematically changing critical machining parameters (spindle speed, depth of cut, and feed rate) so that the characteristics of the micro-fin produced were evaluated based on surface roughness, geometric accuracy of the fins, burr formation, cutting force, and machining time. The test results indicated that the rate of the feed, and depth of cut had a strong influence on the machining performance. An increase in the rate of feed caused 89% increase in the surface roughness and 92% increase in the height of burrs. As a result of the increased spindle speed, surface finish has improved regardless of the material type. In fact, the reduction in surface roughness due to the increased spindle speed is 73%. Likewise, shorter machining times limit tool flank wear by up to 80%. In addition to these machining parameters, fin geometry affects thermal performance. The increase in thickness of the fins caused38% increase in thermal resistance. The optimum spacing between fins was found to be about 2.5–3mm, the thermal resistance was reduced by 23–29% when compared to narrow spacing (3.5 mm). Likewise, a fin height of 40 mm produced the best thermal performance when compared on a thermal resistance basis with fins of shorter height, and only 16% less than fins of greater height.
Rao et al. (Sun,) studied this question.