Lone Ranger

Another nit pickin' question. The Haynes manual says to use silicone dielectric grease on the back of the ICM where it mounts to the ignition coil heat sink bracket. Most of the white colored heat sink compounds, including the one I used on back of my ICM, while made from a silicone base also contain zinc oxide. Zinc is a conductor of electricity. Hmm...

What say you all?

:chevy

Tom Piper

The white paste is usually regarded as the better of the two. But, silicone grease is more readily available and is a good heat conductor.
Most electronic circuits where you are concerned about electrical insulation but good thermal conductivity have an electrical insulator (mica, etc) used to electrically isolate the component along with silicone grease or the white paste on each side to conduct the heat.

Tom Piper

jfb

Zinc oxide is an electrical insulator but conducts heat well.

Lone Ranger

That clears it up. I didn't take into account that it is *oxide* ... I was thinking zinc = metal = conductor.

Thanks for the info :chevy

Corvette0096

I would just get you a tube of that Arctic cold from a PC store.

Iroc

http://www.arcticsilver.com/ :cool: :thumbs:

Haven't used it for car purposes but it works great between my cpu & heatsink, IMHO its the best.


[Modified by Iroc, 6:37 PM 3/13/2003]

Strick

I just bought the ignition control driver that goes on the bracket holding the coil. It came (from the chevy parts depart.) with dielectric grease with instructions to apply on the back of the driver. Dielectric grease is available everywhere. I guess that's all you need.

Strick :cheers:

Lone Ranger

Is the dielectric that came with it clear or is it white?

Strick

It's the clear stuff. If the General says to use it, I listen, most of the time.

Strick

Dominic Sorresso

Use the white grease for the ESC module. Radio Shack has it.