Leef
Enlightened
In making a heat sink for a multi-LED light, is it better to use copper or aluminum?
The thermal conductivity of Cu is much higher, almost double, that of Al. With either material, the sink would be fit snugly into the Al head, bare metal-to-metal, with heat conducting grease. So the main radiator would be the head to the air, and the sink's main job -- after it got significantly hotter than the head -- would be to conduct to the head.
But until some temp. differential were reached, the main effect of the sink would seem to be to absorb heat, thus raising its temperature, so its specific heat may be more important than thermal conductivity.
I'd imagine that one could model this mathematically, but it'd be way beyond me. Anyone have any experience or intuition?
The thermal conductivity of Cu is much higher, almost double, that of Al. With either material, the sink would be fit snugly into the Al head, bare metal-to-metal, with heat conducting grease. So the main radiator would be the head to the air, and the sink's main job -- after it got significantly hotter than the head -- would be to conduct to the head.
But until some temp. differential were reached, the main effect of the sink would seem to be to absorb heat, thus raising its temperature, so its specific heat may be more important than thermal conductivity.
I'd imagine that one could model this mathematically, but it'd be way beyond me. Anyone have any experience or intuition?
