The Thermal Wake Function for Rectangular Electronic Modules

A point heat source model is employed to study the thermal wake function for an array of rectangular electronic modules situated in a uniform flow stream. For the particular case of in-line modules, a simple equation for the wake function is developed in terms of a modified Peclet number. The length scale for the Peclet number is the square of the module width divided by the streamwise spacing of the modules. The downstream decay of the wake function is shown to be well represented by a power law. Sample calculations using the present model are shown to compare well with experimental data for laminar as well as turbulent flows.