Abstract
An efficient cooling system is an essential part of the electronic packaging such as a high-luminance LED lighting. A special technology, Pulsating Heat Pipe (PHP), can be applied to improve cooling of a sealed, explosion-proof LED light fixture. In this paper, the characteristics of the pulsating heat pipes in the imposed thermal boundary conditions of LED lightings were experimentally investigated and a PHP device that works free of alignment angle was investigated for cooling of explosion-proof LED lights. Five working fluids of ethanol, FC-72, R-123, water, and acetone were chosen for comparison. The experimental pulsating heat pipe was made of copper tubes of internal diameter of 2.1 mm, 26 turns. A variable heat source of electric heater and an array of cooling fins were attached to the pulsating heat pipe. For the alignment of the heating part at bottom, an optimum charging ratio (liquid fluid volume to total volume) was about 50% for most of the fluids and water showed the highest heat transfer performance. For the alignment of the heating part on top, however, only R-123 worked in an un-looped construction. This unique advantage of R-123 is attributed to its high vapor pressure gradient. Applying these findings, a cooling device for an explosion-proof type of LED light rated 30 W was constructed and tested successfully.