stillvodka . I will agree with tony .
I have worked as an electronic repair technician for 30 years and have also build many electronic projects over the years .
You do need to add a safety margin and again I would agree with tony . 20% is probably the absolute minimum . 50% is definitely going to be a good idea .
Ok his personal choice to run with 100% safety margin , well that's his choice ......no harm .....but I'd be quite happy around 50% .
As tony says , heat buildup in the device will cause its early demise and a good heat sink and quality heatsink compound help get the heat out of the device .
I replaced a lot of failed transistors due to old crusty heatsink compound drying out .
Note I said early demise . It's not like a critical value , you cross it and you die ,
Think of it like a Red line in your car. It won't explode the second you hit it but the closer you get to it , the more stress you put on the engine . The further away you run your engine from the Red line , the longer it will last .
( LOL , I'm probably going to get a thrashing from the Rev heads saying that
)....sorry
To be honest that unit you have is probably not an the easiest to stick in a box with a heatsink firmly attached while also having the control knob in a safe accessible position . Can't say for sure as I can't see a pic of the back but how do you securely bolt it too a heat sink ?
does it have some tapped holes that you can use ?
Are you ment to fashion some custom clamps to keep the pressure between it and the heatsink ?
Then there is the physical alignment so the heatsink is positioned in the mounting box so that the control shaft is flush with the front panel with the controller sandwiched between .
Not an impossible task but certainly not the easiest thing to put into use .
By the way , you can rest assured that Home distiller forum has many eyes watching it and there are a lot of techy guys here so if someone was giving you the bum stare , we'red all be onto it .
and I would like Other forum members Advice
