Fan vs. passive heat sink with heat pipe in cooling of high power LED

LED light fittings are highly efficient. As a downside, due to the high power density, efficient cooling solutions are needed. This paper presents a comparison between a high-power COB (chip-on-board) LED light fitting that uses the passive cooling method with heat sink and heat pipe and one using the active cooling method with heat sink, fan and heat pipe. This paper discusses how fans, heat pipes and passive heat sinks can be combined to cool high power COB LEDs without significantly increasing the dimensions, mass and complexity of the fitting, and without significantly increasing its power consumption. Although the use of fans and heat pipes for LED cooling is not new, in this paper a comparison is made between the two methods in terms of fitting temperature, LED direct voltage, total power consumption as well as from the point of view of illumination.