LED Heat Sink Developments

Heat sinks help keep LED components at temperatures below their specified maximum operating temperature. There are many different designs and various ways of optimizing LED heat sinks , aluminum heatsinks, Cpu heat sink.

Over time, the technology has progressed with the use of new materials like carbon fiber and boron nitride. These materials are implemented into multi-layer PCBs to efficiently move heat from one fiber ply to the next. Due to their high cost, however, these materials will likely find limited use in future PCB fabrication and may not replace aluminum heat sinks in many LED applications.

Fin-based aluminum or copper heat sinks retain greater acceptance in many LED applications due to their low cost and ideal thermal dissipation characteristics. Aluminum has a highly acceptable thermal conductivity, while copper is about twice as high. Aluminum heat sinks are inexpensive; copper ones cost more and weigh more. Consequently, aluminum is chosen for most cost-effective applications, and copper is used in selected ones where performance reigns over cost.

Finally, while most heat sinks are finned to provide a simple way of increasing surface area for heat radiation and conduction. Newly developed special aluminum fin material is reported to be 15 percent more conductive than fin material used in previous heat sinks. These current developments are sure to become as essential as the heat sink device itself.