Heat Sink Fin Redesign That Lowered Luminaire Temperature by 8°C

Client	A Japanese lighting OEM
Sector	Lighting OEM
Region	Japan
Programme	Heat sink fin design optimisation

Client identity is described by market position rather than by name, in line with our confidentiality commitments.

A heat sink fin design optimisation for a Japanese lighting OEM that reduced luminaire operating temperature by 8°C — the difference between meeting a claimed service life and missing it.

The challenge

LED lumen output and service life are hostage to junction temperature, and the customer's fitting was running hotter than the life claim could support. The enclosure had to dissipate more heat inside an existing envelope — the industrial design was frozen and the tooling budget did not cover a new form factor.

What we did

Fin geometry re-optimised inside the existing envelope

We reviewed the dissipated load, mounting orientation and available convection, then reworked fin pitch and height within the current section footprint. Fins from 0.3 mm let us raise density without growing the housing.

Substrate integrity so heat flows as designed

Ceramic-filtered, degassed and homogenised primary billet removes sand holes and weld lines that create local resistance in the heat path — the thermal design only performs if the material cooperates.

Mounting interface machined for a thin thermal interface

The LED board mounting face was machined for flatness, so the thermal interface layer stayed thin and uniform. This is the detail that most often decides whether a fitting reaches its claimed life.

Validated on the revised section before volume

The improvement was confirmed on samples before production, so the customer had a measured result rather than a simulation claim.

Results

Result	Measured
−8°C	Luminaire operating temperature
0.3 mm	Fin thickness used to raise density
0	Change to the industrial design envelope

• Luminaire operating temperature reduced by 8°C.
• Achieved inside the existing envelope — no new form factor required.
• Fin density raised using 0.3 mm fins without growing the housing.
• Result validated on physical samples before volume production.

Why it held in production

Every stage of this programme ran inside our own plant — tooling design, extrusion, CNC machining, surface treatment and assembly. That is the reason the result repeated rather than appearing once on a first article: when a parameter needs adjusting, we change it and verify it the same day instead of negotiating through a subcontractor. We hold ISO 9001 across the process, with wall thickness at ±0.02 mm against a GB standard of ±0.05 mm and cut-to-length at ±0.005 mm.

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