Thermal interface materials (TIM) are widely used in the automotive industry due to its capacity to transfer the heat and to ensure the electrical insulation between electronic parts and the cooling system. In this thesis, a liquid TIM is studied. The main concern when usinga liquid TIM is about the consequences if air bubbles appear inside the material when it is being applied and its resulting impact on the electrical insulation. This situation has been studied and is presented in this thesis.

Related to the electrical insulation, different tests were done using an insulator tester. Different setups were mounted and tested from 500 V to 10000 V to find the breakdown voltage point of each setup. The main conclusion was that even if just one air bubble appears, the effective thickness of the whole TIM would be reduced to the initial thickness of the TIM minus the size of the bubble. That could be catastrophic for the whole system because the electrical insulation could be broken.

Meanwhile, the same setups and material combinations were also tested to check the thermal conductivity capacity of the system

Since it is not feasible to control the location and size of the possible air bubbles, an electrically insulator film (EIF) was used as a backup in case that the TIM failed as an insulator due to the presence of air bubbles. Using the EIF allows the reduction of the total thickness of the TIM by half, improving the heat transfer of the whole system and ensuring the electrical insulation.