19 December 2012

Mentor Graphics meets future LED auto-lighting needs with enhanced measurement and characterization solutions

Mentor Graphics Corp of Wilsonville, OR, USA says it has made significant advances to its T3Ster+TeraLED measurement and characterization hardware, as well as its FloEFD software simulation products, to meet the needs of lighting developers using arrays of LEDs in headlights, taillights and other transportation industry applications. According to the firm, the product improvements will enable developers to efficiently manage the heat and condensation developed by these arrays thus improving their reliability and life. In addition, with T3Ster and TeraLED hardware’s ability to measure both thermal and optical characteristics of single LEDs and full arrays, proper light quality and color can be achieved.

The FloEFD product has been extended with a dedicated LED module, which enables thermal simulation of the most advanced LED products along with the capability of predicting their “hot lumens” i.e. their total emitted luminous flux at their operating temperatures. This capability is provided through an LED model library whose elements are characterized directly from physical tests by the Mentor T3Ster+TeraLED combined thermal and radiometric/photometric LED testing solution. In addition, the FloEFD LED models support radiation absorption in semi-transparent solids, such as the head or taillight lens.

“LEDs shipped to use in headlamps are forecast to grow significantly from 10m units in 2012 to 78m units in 2018,” said Jamie Fox, lighting and LEDs research manager for IMS Research. “The quality, lifetime and reliability requirements in the automotive sector are very high, higher than most other LED sectors.”

“The use of LEDs in the transportation industry is expanding rapidly, led by Europe but now also prevalent in the US and Asia,” said Erich Buergel, general manager of the Mentor Graphics Mechanical Analysis Division. “We have serviced this industry for several years now but larger, hotter and more complex shaped arrays are driving us to enhance our FloEFD, T3Ster, and TeraLED products to stay ahead of our users’ needs. These enhancements will ensure that the industry is able to advance while maintaining high product reliability and achieving faster times to market.”

To accommodate larger LED arrays, Mentor now provides a 50cm diameter sphere, in addition to its 30cm, on its TeraLED product to measure optical performance. A 50cm sphere is large enough to hold LEDs used in headlights and taillights producing up to 7500 lumens, with cooling for up to 50W of heat dissipation.

Tags: Mentor LEDs LED arrays Automotive LEDs

Visit: http://go.mentor.com/autolight

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