IMS Insulated Metal Substrate PCB

IMS PCBs for Supporting Enhanced Heat Dissipation in Power Components

Thermal management is a common yet important aspect to consider when designing and manufacturing printed circuit boards. Heat from the application equipment, as well as from the external environment, can affect the performance of a PCB. At Build a PCB, we get enquiries from many customers about designing a PCB with a major part dedicated to thermal management. For the requirements of such customers, we offer our IMS PCBs.

What is IMS?

IMS stands for Insulated Metal Substrate. It refers to an insulated dielectric layer, which is bonded to a metallic substrate dielectric layer. The layout of the PCB consists of three layers bonded to each other:

• Circuit Layer (top)
• Dielectric Layers (middle)
• Base Layer

The base layer comprises either copper or aluminum steel. The thickness of the base layer ranges from 1.0mm or 1.6mm.

The primary element in the PCB’s construction is the thermal prepreg. Generally, it is a boron or a ceramic filled clad, which provides low thermal resistance, and allows high voltage breakthroughs. The prepreg helps the PCB to transfer a lot of heat, while maintaining effective insulation. The insulated metal substrate has been tested, and found to have between 8 and 12 times better thermal conductivity than FR4.

Benefits of IMS PCBs

Build a PCB’s IMS printed circuit boards can provide a number of benefits to users and application equipment.

• Compact PCB size
• Increased power density
• Increased product durability
• Fewer number of interconnects
• Better mechanical performance
• Reduced operating temperature
• Easier assembly process in terms of SMT
• Reduction in mounting hardware like heat sinks and thermal materials

Applications

This IMS Printed Circuit Board design allows for optimum thermal management. Build a PCB provides these products as heat sinks, and to enable proper heat dissipation in power components.

• LEDs
• UPS
• Motor drivers
• Solid state relays
• Fork lifting trucks
• Welding machines
• Heat-rail in engines
• Power conversion machines

Build a PCB provides high performance and durable insulated PCBs to support a variety of power and heat application equipment. Contact us if you would like to know about our technical specifications.