Thermal analysis and modelling of planar magnetic components

Abstract

Planar magnetic components are widely used in new designs of power supplies due to advantages that they offer. Several works have been done concerning the optimization of the electrical and magnetic design. However, the thermal design of these components has not been studied deeply, and less information is available to predict the temperatures in core and windings of the component during the design stage. This paper addresses such issues for stand alone planar magnetic components and those with windings integrated in the printed circuit board (PCB). Thermal dissipation methods, models and several experiments are described. They allow a better thermal calculation of the planar magnetics components in the early design stage.