By Venugopal Koka, Director, Electrical & Lighting Marketing for SABIC’s Innovative Plastics business
Thanks to their superior energy efficiency, long lifespan, and lack of high-energy discharge sources, LEDs have dramatically reshaped the lighting industry, bringing a host of new design challenges and opportunities. Lighting engineers need materials that scatter LED light to make it softer and closer to that of incandescent bulbs. They also need designs that can effectively manage heat, a factor that significantly impacts the cost, durability, efficiency and performance of LEDs.
SABIC’s engineering thermoplastics are excellent candidate materials for meeting these design challenges and opportunities. Compared to conventional glass, acrylic, silicone or metal materials, SABIC’s portfolio of specialty resins and compounds introduce expanded design freedoms through lower weight, better mechanical properties, enhanced aesthetics and fewer secondary operations. SABIC’s lighting materials were specifically designed to meet some of the most pressing obstacles facing the LED industry, including:
Balancing Transparency and Diffusion
LED designers are faced with a dilemma. A lamp with insufficient diffusion can create harsh white hot spots. An LED with too much diffusion can mean excessive loss of illuminance, making the bulb less efficient. The newer generations of polycarbonates (PC), such as SABIC’s LEXAN™ LUX resin portfolio, can shield hot spots without compromising light transmission. When used in LED globes or lens covers, PC provides effective diffusion, without the need for secondary lenses or components, thus eliminating, cost, complexity and weight.
Intematix Corporation, a manufacturer of phosphor solutions for LEDs, recently selected SABIC’s LEXAN LUX resin in transparent, diffusion and reflective grades to create the ChromaLit Linear lighting system. Click here for info about the ChromaLit Linear.
High Performance Combined with Flame Resistance
Flame-retardant (FR) materials are one of the main requirements for LED designs. SABIC offers a broad range of grades that deliver flame resistance meeting UL 94 up to 5VA standards in thin wall configurations, as GWFI (IEC) up to 960 °C. Plus, designers can expect additional performance characteristics, including excellent processability, low weight, high impact strength, strong heat resistance and compliance with environmental protocols governing non‑brominated, non-chlorinated and non-phosphorus FR systems.
Thermal Management
The primary cause of lumen depreciation in LEDs is heat generated at the LED junction. Dissipating heat through heat sinks is thus critical for extending performance and useful life. Thermoplastic compounds featuring conductive fillers, such as SABIC’s thermally conductive LNP™ KONDUITTM compound, can provide a comprehensive solution for LED heat sinks without constricting design parameters.
These materials are relatively easy to process and need no expensive secondary operations, such as the machining and finishing of metal parts. In fact, an environmental study conducted by SABIC in partnership with GreenOrder, showed that in W≥4 W, LED heat sinks made with SABIC’s thermally conductive LNP™ KONDUITTM compound with an aluminum insert instead of die cast aluminum can typically avoid 49-67% of the energy consumed and 48-70% of the greenhouse gas emitted during the manufacturing, fabrication, and end of life phases of the heat sink. Click here to learn more about SABIC’s portfolio of materials for cost-efficient hybrid heat sinks.
About Innovative Plastics
SABIC’s Innovative Plastics business is a leading, global supplier of engineering thermoplastics with an 80-year history of breakthrough solutions that solve its customers’ most pressing challenges. Today, Innovative Plastics is a multi-billion-dollar company with operations in more than 35 countries and approximately 9,000 employees worldwide. The company continues to lead the plastics industry with customer collaboration and continued investments in new polymer technologies, global application development, process technologies, and environmentally responsible solutions that serve diverse markets such as Healthcare, Transportation, Automotive, Electrical, Lighting and Consumer Electronics. The company’s extensive product portfolio includes thermoplastic resins, coatings, specialty compounds, film, and sheet. Innovative Plastics (www.sabic-ip.com) is a wholly owned subsidiary of Saudi Basic Industries Corporation (SABIC).