Cree, Inc.

How an engineer’s 21-minute YouTube video on LED Lighting and Thermal Design wiped a sour look off my face

Posted by Ginny Skalski

If you told me a week ago that I would be thoroughly entertained by a 21-minute YouTube video featuring an engineer talking about thermal design, I would’ve shot you one of these looks:

But that was before I was introduced to David L. Jones’ vlog. The title caught my attention right away: “Solid-State LED Lighting, and How Thermal Design Sucks.” Please note, he doesn’t say Solid State LED Lighting sucks.

Dave is an engineer who lives in Sydney, Australia. Armed with a video camera and a heck of a lot of enthusiasm, Dave decided to attach some Cree LEDs to a piece of aluminum to light up his new outdoor deck. For the record, Cree didn’t know he was doing this. I say this because even though he doesn’t like the act of calculating the junction temperature of each LED (hence his blog title … “How Thermal Design Sucks”), he ended up loving the results he achieved with our LEDs. And because he’s so enthusiastic and sincere, I actually sat through the entire 21-minute video and watched him fill up his whiteboard with calculations that are way over my head.

If you don’t have 21 minutes to spare, here are some highlights:

Watch the first four minutes for context. Tune in again at the 17:15 mark to hear his declarations about why his calculations are a waste of time. Then skip to 19:20 to hear him describe the difference between efficacy and efficiency (don’t be fooled by their similar spellings, there is a difference) and then stay tuned for the rest of the video to see what all his hard work went toward.

Dave tells video viewers not to bother writing in and telling him that his model was wrong. So I won’t go into whether his calculations make sense, but stay tuned to the 21 minute mark and you can see that regardless of whether his model was right or wrong, his homemade LED lighting system sure looks sharp.

2 Responses to “How an engineer’s 21-minute YouTube video on LED Lighting and Thermal Design wiped a sour look off my face”

1. Len Aaron says:

   January 24, 2010 at 4:37 am

   HOT DOG!!!

   Glad I bought some CREE stock before the recent Surge…
   Irael-Iran? The $pOIL Weapon @ St. Hormuz? $200-300/Bbl?

   CREE efficiency is a green winner, even without oil wars.
   If energy prices rise for any reason… HOT DIGGITY DOG!!

   Makes me want to go out to build a deck to light & love.
2. DaveJ says:

   January 28, 2010 at 8:45 am

   Glad you enjoyed the video!

   BTW, my model wasn’t either right or wrong, it was pointless!

   Regards
   Dave.