Compared with traditional machined copper plates, the core advantages of MIM process copper plates are concentrated in the three dimensions of complex structure forming, comprehensive performance balance, and mass production cost reduction. It perfectly adapts to the high-precision and high-heat dissipation requirements of high-speed optical modules of 1.6T and above, and solves the long-standing processing pain points of traditional copper plates.
Structural forming advantages
Complex special-shaped structure integrated molding: special-shaped copper plates with dense heat dissipation needles, internal closed micro-channels, and chute buckles can be injected at one time. Traditional CNC machining requires multiple clamping and multi-axis linkage, and some internal channels are even completely impossible to achieve. The MIM process can be completed with only a small amount of subsequent finishing.
No risk of weld leakage: For the micro-channel cold plate of the liquid-cooled light module, the traditional process requires brazing and splicing of two copper plates, which poses hidden dangers of liquid leakage and flux residue; the MIM process directly forms a closed runner, completely eliminating weld defects, and greatly improving the internal cleanliness of the runner.
Extreme thin-walled forming ability: It can stably form ultra-thin heat dissipation shells with a wall thickness of less than 1mm. Traditional machined copper plates are prone to deformation and edge collapse at this thickness. The dimensional tolerance of MIM parts can be controlled within ± 0.5%, which is suitable for the positioning accuracy requirements of optical modules at the micron level.
Comprehensive performance advantage
Material performance customization balance: By customizing the copper alloy powder formula, while retaining the high thermal conductivity of pure copper above 390W/m · K, the hardness and wear resistance of components are greatly improved, and the industry pain points of soft pure copper and frequent plugging and deformation are solved. The hot-swapping life of optical modules is increased by more than 3 times.
The density of the sintered part is close to the theoretical limit: the density of the sintered part can reach more than 97%, the physical and chemical properties far exceed the traditional powder metallurgy copper plate, the tensile strength exceeds 400 MPa, while maintaining more than 97% of the IACS conductivity, taking into account the triple performance of heat dissipation, structural support and electromagnetic shielding.
Special floating structure integration: The heat dissipation cold plate with an independent floating unit can be integrally formed, and the built-in spring balance design can not only closely fit with the optical module shell to reduce the contact thermal resistance, but also completely avoid the insertion of the optical module during hot-swapping. This is an integrated structural design that cannot be achieved by traditional machining copper plates.
