Thermally conductive plastics for LED heat sinks reduce lighting costs, increase design freedom
The LED lighting market is continuing to grow with energy-efficient LED technology poised to become a mainstay in residential and commercial lighting. A challenge the industry must overcome is the high price of LED lighting, especially for incandescent replacements, which remains a barrier for mass adoption. Complicated assembly, made more difficult by the conventional materials available, is a significant contributor to this higher cost. To mitigate this problem, LED manufacturers are looking for better material solutions to help streamline the assembly process.
Bayer MaterialScience developed thermally conductive Makrolon® TC8030 polycarbonate to replace aluminum in heat sinks, thereby reducing assembly steps. Thermally conductive polycarbonate can reduce cost per unit in applications, such as multi-faceted reflector (MR) or parabolic aluminized reflector lamp (PAR) configurations.
Nicolas Sunderland, senior scientist; Jim Lorenzo, principal engineer; and Terry G. Davis, principal engineer, all of Bayer MaterialScience, will present “Novel Polycarbonate Heat Sinks for Efficient Thermal Management,” as part of the LED Packaging session (C3) during ITherm 2014 at 11 a.m., Wednesday, May 28.
Dr. Sunderland will discuss simulations and tests conducted to assess the thermal properties of polycarbonate replacement materials when compared to aluminum in LED heat sinks. The findings conclude that the thermally conductive Makrolon® TC8030 polycarbonate can successfully replace aluminum as a heat sink material, and offer a solid value proposition in reducing assembly cost and creating shapes and features that are not possible with aluminum.
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