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Want to work on the "Mother of All Thermal Challenges?"

W

wymer100

macrumors member
Original poster
Apr 16, 2002
53
0
Apple recently call the powerbook G5 the "mother of all thermal challenges." Well, it looks like they may need a bit more help. Apple put this job opening on monster.com on friday. The job is for a Sr. Thermal Engineer. If you're up for the challenge, have a BS (or higher) in mechanical engineering, and have experience in cooling systems, this'll be the job for you.

http://jobsearch.monster.com/getjob...cy=US&brd=1,1862,1863&lid=&fn=&q=phd+or+ph.d.
 
iCould. You take one of them liquid nitrogen things and you install it, and then you could use a really big fan...

Oh. Wait. We aren't talking about a PeeeCeee laptop here....
 
on one side of this the PBG5's may still be nowhere on the horizon

on another side of this they are making SURE they get it right

and on the last side (am rekoning this is a triangle now!) is that they've finished the PBG5 and are looking for someone for another task, like a G5 mac mini, whenever that would be realeased (prob a year from now but i'd want to get moving with that thinking about the thermal problems it could cause!)
 
Looks like we are at LEAST a year off a Powerbook G5...
I bet it has something to do with Steve's (and others) obscession with perfection to make the perfect Powerbook G5. I know that is a good thing but in the mean time other pc laptops are much faster and better atm and will continue to improve.
http://jobsearch.monster.com/getjob...1&col=dltci&cy=US&brd=1,1862,1863&lid=&fn=&q=
^Lol i looks as if they need a new generation of battery in the Powerbook as well (understandable)
 
that is going to be kind of tricky to find an ME who speilizes in that. the EE cover it quite well but are a bit weaker when ti comes to heat transfers. I guessing the only reason they want the ME is for heat tranfrsing but the ME come up short when it comes to the electroics.
 
I still say they should look into microducts that can carry SUVA refrigerant across the mainboard, and compress the gas via a thermal inductor on the chip. The heated gas can then be cooled via microfibre channels weaved throughout the LCD screen backing, providing a scalable architecture to dissipate thermal energies in a synergistic solution.

Ok, all that was just BS. :)
 
Timelessblur said:
that is going to be kind of tricky to find an ME who speilizes in that. the EE cover it quite well but are a bit weaker when ti comes to heat transfers. I guessing the only reason they want the ME is for heat tranfrsing but the ME come up short when it comes to the electroics.
Click to expand...

Yes an ME for this job is stupid... They should hit a team of chemists... Create a new alloy with an EXTREMELY high specific heat and hold the patent. That is the way to go.
 
frescies said:
Yes an ME for this job is stupid... They should hit a team of chemists... Create a new alloy with an EXTREMELY high specific heat and hold the patent. That is the way to go.
Click to expand...

They can try to make a new alloy element somewhere in between nickel and copper, say a 28.5 on the periodic table? They could make an element between silver and cadmium, perhaps number 47.5, but it could get expensive.
 
Lacero said:
They can try to make a new alloy element somewhere in between nickel and copper, say a 28.5 on the periodic table? They could make an element between silver and cadmium, perhaps number 47.5, but it could get expensive.
Click to expand...

True... you'd need a bonified physical chemistry lab... but a new allow with unbelievable specific heat?.... priceless.
 
An ME for this job is perfect. They just want someone who has worked in electronics packaging which considering the way a lot of MEs go is not going to be hard to find. ME's specialize in thermal heat transfer and it's not the electronics that define what engineer is needed it's what is going on. If I were in industry I'd apply for this job as my undergrad was in ME and I currently do nanotechnology which is spending countless hours in a electronics fabrication clean room.
 
I don't think that having a high heat capacity alloy is going to do you that much good. The problem is not getting the heat out of the chip, but getting the heat out of the chip and also away from the laptop. Having a big piece of hot metal isn't going to do you any good. The problem with most metals that have high heat capacities is that they can store a lot of heat, but it also takes a long time and energy to cool them. I read an article last night about the Cell chips. The article made reference to the heat issues with the Itanium 2 (or was it P4?). Anyway, Intel stuck a peltier cooling unit on the chip. The chip used 100W while the peltier system used another 75W. Ouch!

I'm really surprised they don't do more with carbon fiber to help with heating issues. When I was an undergrad, I heard a talk from a woman who worked with carbon composites in Indianapolis (think Indy 500). She talked about a drag racing team that had a carbon fiber header on the engine. By the time they towed the car back to the mechanics after a drag racing run (about 5-10mins), the header would be cool to the touch. Talk about great heat dissipation.

My prediction for the powerbook G5 is that it's going to have to be a bit thicker enclosure. I bet it's going to be closer to 1.25 to 1.5 inches thick to house the cooling unit. I know that ol' Mr. Jobs wouldn't like it too much, but it would probably be much better for the engineers.
 
frescies said:
Right... High specific heat is irrelevant... Thats why water cooling is an inevitability right?
Click to expand...

Now you're talking about liquids that can be moved through a radiator. That's different than simply working with an alloy. I was imagining them trying to put a big chunk of metal on top of the chip with fans blowing air across it. That probably wouldn't work well because the space is so confining. A liquid-based approach is probably the most likely, but you've got to figure out a way to make it rugged.

I will have to do a little digging, but I don't think the liquid in the 2.5GHz G5 powermac is water, or a least pure water. They are probably using some sort of glycol-based solution similar to the antifreeze you can put in your car. That solution has a very high heat capacity, but there are certainly good mechanisms to put that thermal energy away from the laptop.
 
Well said, ME is perfect for this job

Zeke said:
An ME for this job is perfect. They just want someone who has worked in electronics packaging which considering the way a lot of MEs go is not going to be hard to find. ME's specialize in thermal heat transfer and it's not the electronics that define what engineer is needed it's what is going on. If I were in industry I'd apply for this job as my undergrad was in ME and I currently do nanotechnology which is spending countless hours in a electronics fabrication clean room.
Click to expand...

Just like any high-tech industry, you want someone with experience dealing with cooling (ME is perfect and easy to find these days for this field) and you want to have an economical, innovative solution (not some new research into an alloy or coolant that will take more than a year to develop, then another year to figure out how to manufacture it). Apple knows what they are doing and they will have a solution soon.

ps. this is a problem I keep encountering, no one seems to know exactly what an ME does, its absolutely ridiculous to see so many people, especially EE's who think thermal issues arent in the realm of ME's. It def. shows a lack of communication within the engineering profession and the rest of the world.
 
Studawg7 said:
ps. this is a problem I keep encountering, no one seems to know exactly what an ME does, .
Click to expand...

ME's make the bombs.
Civil Engineers make the targets.
 
you guys are nuts... an ME is perfect for this job, provided they've got the proper work experience.

heat transfer is an essential part of an ME curiculum, and most schools offer more than a little training on the EE side of things as well.
 
Clearly, all they need to do is to attach a Sterling engine to turn that waste heat into electricity. An ME would be perfect for that. The G5 could chug along, powered in part by electricity from its own recovered heat, while the engine itself could spin a little Apple logo. Sure, it'd weigh 50 pounds, but no one - no one - in the PC laptop world would have a Sterling engine heat recovery unit in their cruddy little 5GHz Pentium laptop.
 
Actually the specific heat of antifreeze is less than water...antifreeze is used for corrosion inhibition and (obviously) antifreeze.

wymer100 said:
Now you're talking about liquids that can be moved through a radiator. That's different than simply working with an alloy. I was imagining them trying to put a big chunk of metal on top of the chip with fans blowing air across it. That probably wouldn't work well because the space is so confining. A liquid-based approach is probably the most likely, but you've got to figure out a way to make it rugged.

I will have to do a little digging, but I don't think the liquid in the 2.5GHz G5 powermac is water, or a least pure water. They are probably using some sort of glycol-based solution similar to the antifreeze you can put in your car. That solution has a very high heat capacity, but there are certainly good mechanisms to put that thermal energy away from the laptop.
Click to expand...
 
Studawg7 said:
ps. this is a problem I keep encountering, no one seems to know exactly what an ME does, its absolutely ridiculous to see so many people, especially EE's who think thermal issues arent in the realm of ME's. It def. shows a lack of communication within the engineering profession and the rest of the world.
Click to expand...

EE's doing heat stuff? Thats surreal. Most of the EE's I knew did their best to avoid thermo at all costs. With heat you want a Mech or Chem, depending on what exactly the problem is.

The way I figured it was Mech E's do everything the others don't want to. :)

I really should apply.
 
Zeke said:
Actually the specific heat of antifreeze is less than water...antifreeze is used for corrosion inhibition and (obviously) antifreeze.
Click to expand...

Oops! Forgot about the lower specific heat. But, antifreezes still have a high specific heat compared to other liquids with about 85% of water near 200F with a 1:1 mix of glycol and water. Plus, the bp would be at about 230F.
 
G5 in an iPod. :eek: :p ;) :)


Actually liquid cooling the G5 in a notebook form factor is very possible, its the other components that are ADDING to the cumulative heat output such as HDD, Optical Drive, Battery, etc..

There is a very early technology and it has nothing to do with cooling however in the process it keeps the system cool as a side effect. <--I don't think we will see this technology put into place yet, since photon technology is one of its competitors. :)
 
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