Experimental study of the heat dissipation of battery with a manifold micro-channel heat sink

•A manifold micro-channel heat sink with high depth-to-width ratio is designed.•The new heat sink is compared with the traditional heat sink by experiments.•The index of temperature uniformity evaluation coefficient is proposed.•The key factors affecting the performance of the heat sink are investigated.•The new heat sink has a better heat dissipation advantage for the battery. Lithium ion battery is the core part of electric vehicle, and its heat dissipation problem not only restricts its development, but also brings many safety risks to electric vehicle. In order to assist the heat dissipation of the battery better, the heat dissipation performance and pressure drop characteristics of a new high depth to width ratio manifold micro-channel heat sink were studied in this paper. An experimental platform was built to test and compare the related performance of the new heat sink and the traditional heat sink under different discharge rates and different inlet flow rates with water as the working fluid. The experimental results show the two heat sinks have similar heat dissipation performance, but the total pressure drop of the traditional heat sink is always larger than that of the new heat sink. Especially when the inlet flow rate is 100 ml/min, the total pressure drop of the traditional heat sink is 8.23 times that of the new heat sink. Therefore, the new heat sink has a better heat dissipation advantage for the battery while considering saving pump power.