LED lamp - design and thermal management investigations

The aims of this work are connected with development of new method of LEDs´ mounting onto the heat sink in lighting equipment. The technique involves usage of copper pins instead of standard MCPCBs. LEDs are soldered on copper pins. Mounting of LEDs demands boring holes in the heat sink and fixing copper pins into the holes by thermal conductive epoxy resin only. LED lamp is made using new technology and LEDs´ thermal performance investigations are made at various ambient conditions (air temperatures from 20°C to 45°C) and different current values through LEDs - up to 600 mA. Temperature regimes of operation of power LEDs soldered on MCPCBs and on copper pins (and mounted on heat sink) are experimentally tested and compared. Experimental results show that utilization of copper pins underneath LED thermal pads ensures good dissipation of heat, good manufacturability, enables varied designs of light equipment and is cost effective.