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The Challenge
An industrial automation company needed to reduce manufacturing costs of their 250kW variable frequency drive by 40% while maintaining performance. The existing design used expensive custom heat sinks and required manual thermal paste application, leading to quality variations and high assembly costs. The target was a design suitable for high-volume production with automated assembly.
Our Approach
- Analyzed existing thermal stack and identified cost drivers
- Redesigned heat sink using standard aluminum extrusion profiles
- Replaced thermal paste with pre-applied phase-change material
- Optimized PCB layout to reduce thermal via requirements
- Implemented clip-mount system for tool-less power module installation
- Validated thermal performance across production tolerance ranges
Results
40%
Cost Reduction
BOM cost reduced from $1,200 to $720
-60%
Assembly Time
From 45 min to 18 min per unit
0.1% RMA
Quality
Reduced thermal failures in field