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Anyone using ARTIC HEAT SINK COMPOUND . . . STOP !!!

unit_399

unit_399

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Jun 17, 2008
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I had one of my amps blow a pair of Toshiba 2SC2879s. Sent it back to the builder and he said that the heat sink compound had completely dried up to powder. He said that he used ARTIC HEAT SINK COMPOUND when he did the update for me. Evidentally more expensive doesn't mean better. He had also updated my TX600. So, I pulled one of the pills from my 600, and the compound had dried up under it too. I was using the 8 pill on 26.805 FM when the transistors blew. So keying 1600 watts continuous with no heat transferring to the sink caused the failures. Luckily, I never ran the 600 on FM. But I have to pull the remaining pills on the 600 and replace the compound. PITA !!

IF ANY OF YOU GUYS ARE USING THE ARTIC COMPOUND - STOP !! Throw the rest of it into the nearest trash can and go back to silicone-based compound.

A word to the wise.

J.J. 399
 
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Hey JJ, did he deck/hone the heatsink and mating surface of the pills and smooth any ridge from the threaded holes? I use the arctic mx2 and never had an issue although it acts like a non-newtonian fluid sometimes. I will check out some previous work for drying, but as thin of a layer as I apply, and considering most of that pushes out, I wouldn't think drying would be an issue, as long as it filled the micro imperfections and still transfers heat, wet or not. I could see this being an issue if the parts don't make great contact, but I deck all mating surfaces for a flat, near mirror finish so it may not matter. I will be watching this thread for sure.
 
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unit_399 said:
I had one of my amps blow a pair of Toshiba 2SC2879s. Sent it back to the builder and he said that the heat sink compound had completely dried up to powder. He said that he used ARTIC HEAT SINK COMPOUND when he did the update for me. Evidentally more expensive doesn't mean better. He had also updated my TX600. So, I pulled one of the pills from my 600, and the compound had dried up under it too. I was using the 8 pill on 26.805 FM when the transistors blew. So keying 1600 watts continuous with no heat transferring to the sink caused the failures. Luckily, I never ran the 600 on FM. But I have to pull the remaining pills on the 600 and replace the compound. PITA !!

IF ANY OF YOU GUYS ARE USING THE ARTIC COMPOUND - STOP !! Throw the rest of it into the nearest trash can and go back to silicone-based compound.

A word to the wise.

J.J. 399
Click to expand...
I always use silicon based thermal grease/paste, even on my custom computer builds. You are right I have seen to many with dried up issues and also thermal paste creep which is a huge issue with exposed electrical connections because some of that stuff is conductive. ALWAYS USE SILICON BASED!!!!!!!!
 
Cable Guy said:
Hey JJ, did he deck/hone the heatsink and mating surface of the pills and smooth any ridge from the threaded holes? I deck all mating surfaces for a flat, near mirror finish so it may not matter. I will be watching this thread for sure.
Click to expand...
Yes he does that and I always do too. 2SC2879s always have a little bump on the center bottom of the their die cast base. I noticed when removing the transistor from my TX600 that it didn't take any effort to break the screws loose. Maybe drying out causes the compound to lose density opening up the space between the pill and the sink ever so slightly.

I always have used Dow Corning #340 heat sink compound. messy but works good.

J.J.399
 
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There's a thermal compound called Liquidmetal that is a problem, I ran into this stuff doing work on computers.
Upside,it has fantastic thermal properties.
Down side, it's liquid, really it's a liquid so if you over apply it it will actually migrate across the heatsink spreader and it's really metal, conductive metal, so if any of it migrates onto conductive traces it promptly shorts out the traces......
Nasty stuff that we removed every time I found it and replaced with fresh silicon compound.

73
Jeff
 
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I use ARCTIC MX-6 on my CPU. It suppose to have non-drying and non-bleeding properties ensure consistent long-term performance. It didn't dry out after 6 months on my AMD 9800X3D with 360mm AIO cooler.
 
unit_399 said:
I had one of my amps blow a pair of Toshiba 2SC2879s. Sent it back to the builder and he said that the heat sink compound had completely dried up to powder. He said that he used ARTIC HEAT SINK COMPOUND when he did the update for me. Evidentally more expensive doesn't mean better. He had also updated my TX600. So, I pulled one of the pills from my 600, and the compound had dried up under it too. I was using the 8 pill on 26.805 FM when the transistors blew. So keying 1600 watts continuous with no heat transferring to the sink caused the failures. Luckily, I never ran the 600 on FM. But I have to pull the remaining pills on the 600 and replace the compound. PITA !!

IF ANY OF YOU GUYS ARE USING THE ARTIC COMPOUND - STOP !! Throw the rest of it into the nearest trash can and go back to silicone-based compound.

A word to the wise.

J.J. 39 I have worked on several "NEW" amps recently, that used some kind pf garbage heat sink compound. One, a Donkey Stomper, had almost no compound, and some with none making the surfaces meet, so it blew up. He used some kind of garbage compound, like that arctic silver crap for PC's.
Click to expand...
Word to the wise...Dow 340 , there is no substitute.
 
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Thats pricey stuff SuperLid.

I have been using the cheapest silicone paste I could find on mouser, MG chemicals 860, with no issue. $20 for a 150g tube. So far, I have no complaints.

edit: its up to $26 now
 
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I used the MX-4 cpu paste. Has been fine so far. I recently took apart the RM Italy 203P and the paste was still fine and not breaking down/flaking away. I suppose I can keep an eye out more on the radios/amps of mine I used it on so far. CPUs and GPUs of today get extremely hot and running longer periods of times. One older GPU I had I used MX-4, and after a few years it was still holding up fine.

I suppose at this rate, avoid low quality thermal paste.
 
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I checked a 2x 2290 that I did some 5 years ago, still wet. Pulled the heatsink from my nas server that I built near 8 years ago, runs 24/7, still wet, although the line of excess that squeezed out upon installation was kinda sludgy. This stuff is rated for 8 years and I needed to check it anyways. Idk, maybe your tech had a bad batch or my equipment isn't run hard enough to cause thermal failure.
 

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