Thermal management and design optimization for a high power LED work light

Abstract

This thesis work deals with the optimization project of the heat sink and explains in details the design path of the thermal aspect of a long-life, high quality LED work light, as well as some general fundamentals of product design and manufacturing to consider. Although the path from an idea to the finished product is described mainly from the thermal aspect; the entire process of electronics development and casing mechanical design is not included in this thesis work. The study was done for Five Watts Oy, a company based in Finland designing, developing and manufacturing LED work light solutions for heavy duty equipment. The first prototypes of LED work light were made without proper cooling simulations and thus did not provide sufficient cooling of the LEDs; in a space with no external airflow the prototypes always reached overheat protection temperatures. A proper Computational Fluid Dynamics simulation was made to optimize the most crucial part of the cooling fins, the spacing. The results of the simulation were integrated into overall work light design; nowadays the product is on the market and functioning successfully.