PIC's in space

[Charles Linquis]

A lot of the thermal analysis tools we use (FlowWorks, for example) allows you to assign materials and heat sources (in Watts, BTUs, or other units). You build your mechanical model, assign all heat sources (7805's or PICs or whatever), tell it what the conductivity and "emissivity" rating of the materials and surfaces (flat black, shiny black, titanium , aluminum alloy, etc), and tell the program it must use "radiation only", and it will tell you what temperature it will stabilize at. Sometimes you have to add to radiant sources - a large heater called "the sun" and a smaller one called "the earth".

It is totally amazing what FEA and thermal analysis tools can do these days.

[Ioannis]

IR was what I thought too. But I suppose that the size in this case would be considerably larger. This would add to the total weigh too.

Very interesting subject.

Thanks for the inputs.

Ioannis