How to select a heat sink
Not sure if you need a heat sink for your design? Determining when and how to implement a heatsink is a straightforward process, but it does involve running a few calculations.
Heat sinks play an important role in circuit design, providing an efficient path for heat to be transferred into the ambient air and away from electronic devices. Without them, many electronics such as BJTs, MOSFETs, linear regulators, BGA packages, and so on are more likely to overheat, causing damage or complete component failure.
To further understand a heat sink’s importance, watch this video from Same Sky. Here you can walk through a simple thermal calculation example that can be used to determine if a heat sink is needed, and if so, how to properly specify a heat sink based on your system requirements.
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