A thermal protection module for automotive integrated circuits

Automotive ICs work in wide ambient temperature range up to 150${}^{\circ }$C. It is important to design an over temperature protection mechanism for the reliability of ICs and systems. A thermal protection module for the automotive ICs is reported in this paper. Dual channel detection and decision scheme was designed based on band gap voltage reference. Precision thermal protection point was set by serial resistors and the variations of power supply, temperature and the process were removed by the resistor ratio. The thermal protection module was implemented in CSMC 0.5 $\mu \mathrm{\text{m}}$ 60 V BCD process, incorporated in a CAN transceiver chip. The area of the module was about 0.02 mm² and thus it was very compact and low cost to integrate in chips. The performance of the thermal protection parameters was measured in incubators. The thermal shutdown temperature was about 164.4${}^{\circ }$C and the thermal recovery temperature was about 153${}^{\circ }$C with hysteresis temperature of 10 K. Additionally, the thermal protection module showed good consistency with different chips.