Thermal management solution for enclosed controller used in inverter air conditioner based on heat pipe heat sink

•A novel thermal management solution for cooling enclosed controller is developed.•Heat pipe heat sink and micro fan are designed for optimal cooling effectiveness.•The solution is validated experimentally to be better than direct air cooling method. Enclosing the controller in an inverter air conditioner can prevent the damage from insects and dusts in the ambience, but may decrease the efficiency of heat dissipation. The objective of this study is to propose a novel thermal management solution based on the heat pipe heat sink (HPHS) for cooling the enclosed controller. The heat flux of the chips in the controller is transferred to a HPHS by the forced convection supplied by an internal micro fan and then dissipated to the ambience. Two types of HPHSs (i.e. U-type and L-type) are designed, and the location of micro fan is optimized. The application of the proposed solution in a real inverter air conditioner shows that, the thermal management employing L-type HPHS is the better one and can reduce the average temperatures of small-power chips and large-power chips by 10.0 °C and 5.9 °C, respectively.