Gold Leaf for Cooling?

[Bad Maniac]

What do you guys think?

Gold has a VERY high heat transfer coefficent, has it not?
What about using common gold leaf/gold foil from an art supplier instead of Arctic silver or anything similar. Gold foil is VERY thin, must hav better heat transfer rate, and since it is very thin and gold is already a very soft metal, putting a gold leaf betwwen the cpu and the heatsink would squeeze the gold leaf to very exact fit against the two surfaces, giving a very good contact, and a very good transfer.

This is just an idea I have been playing with, and I dont have equippment to test it at the moment. Please give me input on this topic.

 

[Spewn]

Actually gold has a lower heat transfer rate than silver AND copper. Interestingly enough it also has a lower electrical conductivity than both silver and copper. However, I believe it is used in many electircal components due to it's low tendency to corrode, and it's malleability(it's very smushy, so they can make pins out of it/mold it onto pins very easily). Find a periodic table that lists heat transfer properties, you can find out information like that there. Also, the "gold leaf" that you buy from an arts supply store probably isn't actually gold, or at least nothing like pure gold. About an ounce of gold can be flattened into a sheet the size of a tennis court, THAT is gold leaf, and costs you both your testicles, and one of your *** cheeks to buy, simply because it's incredibly difficult and time consuming to make gold leaf(if you tear it even a tiny bit, unless you're at the very end, you have to start allll over again).

 

[cjtune]

Are you sure, Spewn? The properties table in my heat transfer textbook lists pure gold as having a heat transfer COEFFICIENT of 317 W/(K.m). Pure copper's is at 401 W/(K.m). and pure aluminium's at 237 W/(K.m). Stainless steel is around 13 to 15 W/(K.m) -and the surface of a boiling kettle can still scald you. Heat transfer RATE depends on geometry, area of contact, and temperature difference, as well as the heat transfer coefficient of a metal. Any how, gold is expensive, and yes, it's very chemically inert (which includes oxidation/corrosion).

 

[dew042]

a thermal properties list....its quite extensive...

http://www.ai.mit.edu/people/tk/tks/tcon.html

dew.

 

[Phil]

Yeah he's right
It goes a little something like this...

cvd diamond
Silver
Copper
Gold
Aluminium
Wood

cvd diamond is far too costly though, silver is the best practical solution but still costly, copper is cheap and good but is hard to work with and heavy and aluminium is great at everything but heat transfer which it's just ok at.

I've read about someone who tryed gold leaf and though silver is a better condicter than gold, Artic silver isn't so gold leaf may be quite good as long as air doesn't get trapped during instalation

 

[el]

I have gold leaf and silver foil if anyone wants to send me an *** check I will mail some to you!!! LOL

seriously if you want to trade some 80mm fans I will send some to you to test out.

 

[cjtune]

I think there is some fancy restaurant somewhere which serves dishes with thin, gold foil, and gold dust. You supposed to EAT it along with the other stuff. Can't remember where tho, saw it a long time ago on TV.

 

[Phil]

I recomend leaving it with some pressure (Either from the heatsink clip or using a clamp) for a while to crush the gold leaf into place as well.

 

[Bad Maniac]

How close to Pure silver is the arctic silver paste then? If you could get (and leaf gold IS rather pure) pure gold then it might have good properties. Anyone know how good the silver paste is compared to the real thing?

 

[Phil]

it's about 80% silver but it's not the content that does it. It's it being micronised to form a paste and to help against electrical conduction.

 

[cjtune]

I think Arctic Silver 2 is rated at 8 W/(K.m).

 

[Phil]

And I think silver is rated at about 60

 

[Magistrate]

What about Silver Leaf? Does such a thing exist?

 

[sfa ok]

cjtune (Jun 20, 2001 11:01 a.m.):
I think there is some fancy restaurant somewhere which serves dishes with thin, gold foil, and gold dust. You supposed to EAT it along with the other stuff. Can't remember where tho, saw it a long time ago on TV.

I had some pie at a Russian restaurant with gold dust on it. The gold dust didn't have a whole lot of taste, but it was pretty neat! I like pie.

 

[Spewn]

cjtune (Jun 20, 2001 09:40 a.m.):
Are you sure, Spewn? The properties table in my heat transfer textbook lists pure gold as having a heat transfer COEFFICIENT of 317 W/(K.m). Pure copper's is at 401 W/(K.m). and pure aluminium's at 237 W/(K.m). Stainless steel is around 13 to 15 W/(K.m) -and the surface of a boiling kettle can still scald you. Heat transfer RATE depends on geometry, area of contact, and temperature difference, as well as the heat transfer coefficient of a metal. Any how, gold is expensive, and yes, it's very chemically inert (which includes oxidation/corrosion).

what do you mean am I sure? If stainless steel is lower than copper, and aluminum is lower than copper, then obviously higher = better, right? Seeing as the area of contact and temperature difference won't change depending on whether you use gold or silver or copper, you basically just said what I said, that gold wouldn't be as good as silver OR copper at transferring heat

 

[William]

gold is an excellent conductor, but copper and especially silver are better. I am chemistry nut, so I am quite sure. Whoever posted about Gold being used because it doesn't corrode is quite right, thats golds weirdish trait is that it does not corrode at all. I can actually explain why(it transfers an electron from a different shell) but as far as pure conductivity goes, its lower, and would still be pricier. The best metal to use to keep from corrosion with a good thermal conductivity would have to Platinum. My chemistry teachers wedding ring is platinum becuase it is extremely unreactive. But of course, one can only really try it before we can say whether we are right. This very well may be better than Artic Silver.

 

[CrystalMethod]

Hell! Grab that puppy and beat it into some platinum leaf to share with all of us! I'm sure your teacher wouldn't mind. After all, it's all in the name of science, right?
...well sort of...

 

[William]

i don't think i could beat her up. She has a black belt and regularly does Karate. Plus a friend of hers trains the attack dogs for the miami police and he trained her dog. So in fear of my life, i don't think i willl do that.

 

[CpuWaterCool.com]

I read this a while back. Go out and search for a silver dollar or other pure but cheap coin (silver). It was $3 USD or so. Take it and lap it to death. Place VERY VERY thin layer of grease and sandwich between slug and HSF. If I remember correctly, that netted the reviewer about 3-5c.

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[Kingslayer]

This is actually very interesting. But wouldnt gold leaf totally defeat the purpose that paste was created for.

The whole idea with the paste, is to fill the nooks and crannies of both the heatsink and the core, improving the efficiency of the cooling process, by increasing surface area. Silver is just added to the paste to increase the coefficient of the paste. Yes, gold is very malleable, but, there isn't a heatsink that creates enough pressure to force it into the nooks and crannies of a heatsink. You will actually lose surface area by using the gold. Even with the Global-Win gorilla clips.

Just my $.02.