News and New Products

LED-metal substrates get sticky with thermally conductive adhesive

By Margery Conner, Technical Editor -- EDN, 4/24/2009

Bergquist has introduced its Bond Ply 450 thermal-interface material, which eases heat removal from LED assemblies when you combine it with the company’s Thermal Clad metal substrate. The peel-and-stick aspect of mounting an LED substrate is attractive for ease of assembly, but sticky-mounting approaches usually have two drawbacks: The stickiness degrades during the heat of solder reflow, and the adhesive generally acts as an insulator—a drawback when your goal is to remove heat from the LED substrate.

The Bond Ply 450 PA withstands solder temperatures and has a thermal impedance of 0.87°C in.²/W. Although it’s difficult to set a price on a product for custom designs, Bergquist estimates a price of approximately  12 cents/in.² (10,00 to 25,000), including the Bond-ply material and its preapplication.