Conflux develops additively manufactured cold plates for next-gen aviation

January 13, 2025

Conflux Technology has developed an additively manufactured battery pack cold plate in collaboration with a leading aerospace company (Courtesy Conflux)
Conflux Technology has developed an additively manufactured battery pack cold plate in collaboration with a leading aerospace company (Courtesy Conflux)

Conflux Technology, based in Geelong, Australia, has developed a custom additively manufactured battery pack cold plate in collaboration with a leading aerospace company.

The plates support the advancement of electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft and are critical in preventing overheating by dissipating heat from batteries, inverters and electronics. Compact solutions are better-suited for modern – often smaller – aviation environments, explains Conflux.

The plates support the advancement of electric vertical takeoff and landing aircraft (Courtesy Conflux)
The plates support the advancement of electric vertical takeoff and landing aircraft (Courtesy Conflux)

The aerospace company needed a cold plate that could effectively manage heat from their battery packs while significantly reducing weight compared to conventional designs. Achieving this balance was vital to meeting the performance goals for their eVTOL aircraft, where lighter components could enhance energy efficiency, extend range, lower operational costs, and allow for greater payload flexibility.

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Conflux explored several design concepts to achieve the necessary weight and thermal performance balance. With Design for AM (DfAM) principles, the team developed a modular cold plate design to enable easy scalability options – allowing for multiple battery packs to be cooled with a single inlet and outlet. This design achieves flexibility not possible with traditional manufacturing methods. Key strategies included optimising wall thickness, refining internal fin structures, and ensuring alignment with required pressure drop and thermal performance targets.

Maintaining a precise flatness tolerance was a critical requirement to ensure seamless integration and optimal thermal contact with the battery packs. By refining its Additive Manufacturing process and optimising proprietary post-processing techniques, Conflux was reportedly able to surpass the necessary tolerance levels so that the cold plate met stringent performance and integration standards.

Weight reductions are achieved through thinner wall thickness (Courtesy Conflux)
Weight reductions are achieved through thinner wall thickness (Courtesy Conflux)

Through iterative design improvements, Conflux achieved weight reductions by reducing the wall thickness up to 50%, resulting in significant weight savings without sacrificing structural integrity. This resulted in a final cold plate design that is 42% lighter than initial estimates, beating the target weight reduction goals.

The cold plate design incorporated optimised fluid channels and fluid manifolding to improve flow distribution. Manifold design was critical in this space and weight constrained application to ensure efficient use of the flow through the modular cold plate design. This optimisation undertaken by Conflux was said to have reduced temperature variation across the surface by approximately 80%, enabling more uniform cooling to meet thermal requirements.

This project showcased advancements in aerospace applications, highlighting the advancements that AM allows when producing lightweight, high-performance cold plates and – on a larger scale – its use in the production of lightweight, high-performance thermal components.

Outside of aerospace, cold plates are used in a variety of industries, including electronics, automotive, renewable energy, medical devices and date centres.

www.confluxtechnology.com

 

 

 

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