Thermal Management System for Solid State Automotive Lighting
First Claim
1. An automotive lighting system comprising:
- a housing;
a lens enclosing a forward face of said housing;
a heat sink including at least one surface outside said housing to radiate heat;
a light source assembly including a heat pipe having a first side, to which an electronic circuit can be attached, and an edge to which at least one semiconductor light source is mounted, said at least one semiconductor light source being electrically connected to an electronic circuit for operating said at least one light source and said heat pipe being thermally connected to said heat sink and to said at least one semiconductor light source; and
a reflector within said housing, said reflector being located opposite said lens and facing said edge such that light emitted by said at least one semiconductor light source is reflected past said light source assembly and through said lens.
2 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
An automotive lighting system employing semiconductor light sources includes LED light sources (52) which are mounted to an edge of a heat pipe (44) such that emitted light from the LED light sources travels toward a reflector (32) at the back of the housing (24) of the system, where it is reflected and/or focused forward through the lens (40) of the system. The heat pipe is thermally connected to a heat sink (35) which extends outside of the housing and which operates to remove heat from the LED light sources. The thickness of the heat pipe is significantly less than the size of the reflector, so that only a small amount of reflected light from the LED light sources is obscured.
38 Citations
14 Claims
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1. An automotive lighting system comprising:
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a housing;
a lens enclosing a forward face of said housing;
a heat sink including at least one surface outside said housing to radiate heat;
a light source assembly including a heat pipe having a first side, to which an electronic circuit can be attached, and an edge to which at least one semiconductor light source is mounted, said at least one semiconductor light source being electrically connected to an electronic circuit for operating said at least one light source and said heat pipe being thermally connected to said heat sink and to said at least one semiconductor light source; and
a reflector within said housing, said reflector being located opposite said lens and facing said edge such that light emitted by said at least one semiconductor light source is reflected past said light source assembly and through said lens. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14)
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Specification