Skiving involves shaving thin metal layers from a solid block to create intricate fins that increase surface area and improve heat dissipation. Our skived heatsinks offer superior performance and durability, making them ideal for various industries and applications. We pride ourselves on using only the best materials and techniques to create heatsinks that meet the highest standards of quality and reliability. Check our skived heatsinks if you need a reliable and efficient cooling solution.
Air Cooling
Skived Heatsink
What is a Skived Heatsink?
A Skived Heatsink offers excellent thermal properties compared with other manufacturing methods as it offers a thin finned heatsink, with a dense population of uniformly shaped and distributed fins. A Skived heatsink is made from a single block of material such as copper or aluminum and does not have additional interface resistances that are common to other heatsink manufacturing processes such as stamped or folded fin, where a further thermal resistance is present due to the use of solder to attached the fins. This combination of high aspect ratio thin fins with no thermal resistance interface produces optimum cooling performance in high airflow applications.
How is a Skived Heatsink Manufactured?
A Skived heatsink is manufactured using a skiving machine that uses a blade to cut material in thin slices, and then push the skived fins up. For a heatsink application, the manufacture of ultra-thin fins as thin as 0.008” is possible.
The process facilitates high aspect ratios that provide greater surface area for maximum heat dissipation. We typically use this process for copper Skived heatsinks, however aluminum Skiving is also possible.
The Skiving process has minimal setup fees, which make it ideal for the rapid prototyping of new designs. Our experience with the Skiving process allows us to machine additional features into the heatsink after the skiving process has been completed, without introducing undue stress.
How to Identify a Skived Heatsink?
It is fairly easy to identify a Skived heatsink as the heatsink has a curve where the blade finishes its cut at the base of the heatsink, as shown in the image.
In addition, the fins are not completely vertical, and curve slightly, which is more pronounced as the fins get taller.
The typical width of a Skived heatsink base is 200 mm, but it is possible to manufacture up to 400 mm wide heatsinks by rotating the block of material and running a second pass with the curvature of the fins in the opposite direction.
As a Skived heatsink is manufactured from a long block of material, the only real limit to the length of the heatsink is the length of the block. Different heights can be achieved by machining the block of material. Any excess material is recycled to reduce wastage. Typical finishes for aluminum skived heatsinks are anodization or nickel plating. Typical finishes for copper Skived heatsinks are anti-oxidant or nickel plating.
Skived Heatsink Example
In this example a copper skived heatsink was manufactured to create two sets of fins with different heights. Some of the taller fins were removed, and additional machining operations were added to accommodate other components in the assembly. Originally the customer was using a CNC machine to make the copper heatsink. By making a few changes to the heatsink drawing, they were able to utilize a higher performing heatsink with lower manufacturing costs.
Skived Heatsink examples
In this example, the customer had an issue where additional software programming caused the chip to create more heat. This incident occurred close to product release. A replacement heatsink was required to have the same form factor as the original heatsink and fit on the board using the same push pin hole locations. A copper skived heatsink was quickly manufactured, and additional machining operations created a modified base to allow this higher performing heatsink to replace the older design.