Alun Morgan on Thermal Management and LEDs in Automotive

Estimated reading time: 18 minutes

Morgan: The first question was, “How much better is the treatment on the radiative side of the aluminium?” We can improve the performance overall of the system by around 15%, so that was one question I hadn’t expected.

Warner: Now that you’ve developed the solution and have test cycling, we all know that automotive has the most stringent requirements, such as zero defect, as you mentioned. How do you supply the solution to these T1s in a scalable way?

Morgan: Each of the T1 suppliers has their own test cycles, so you need to do this one by one. We’ve done this with two of them, and they’ve both qualified it through their own test program that is unique to them. They’re not the same; for example, there are different dwell times and numbers of cycles, but that’s the way it runs. We took the most stringent of these tests that we knew of and built to that. Now, those two T1 suppliers have that solution at all of their sites worldwide and are using it; it’s in production.

Warner: Congratulations on that. That seems like a big win for Ventec.

Morgan: Yes, and thermal management is something that has become very important now.

Warner: It sure has.

Morgan: Right from the outset of the talk, we discussed areas of the vehicle where thermal management has become critical again. In the past, with internal combustion engines, there was a different regime with that kind of system. There are areas where you have high heat dissipating devices, and LEDs would be one of them. Just imagine the engine management systems now with all of the converters, inverters, and power required on an electric vehicle. I found around 20 areas on the vehicle that are issues for thermal management that all use thermal interface materials, so they need to connect and couple heat-diffusing devices to something else.

I also talked about LEDs, which is just one of those 20 areas, and some of the solutions require additional material to be bolted on afterward. Others can have an integrated solution; for example, the inverters can have an integrated solution as well. Traditionally, it would have a big heat sink on the back, but it doesn’t need to be that way. So, it opens up a whole world of new possibilities that wasn’t around before electromobility was around. We have inverters, power converters, and a lot of power in these vehicles that have 100-kilowatt hours in the batteries. We have power trains that take a huge current. What are we going to do with that heat? It’s not something that we can get away from.

I also mentioned the energy available in an electromotive solution, so in a battery-powered vehicle, only around 55% is used for motion and 45% is used for other things. Motion is just about half of it, and the rest of it is used for other stuff—heating, cooling, electrical systems, headlamps, and all of the other stuff. There’s a whole world of power out there you have to deal with.

Warner: With all of the unique challenges, I imagine.

Morgan: Absolutely. Some challenges are in the transmission system, fluid, or the air. The battery is also a big issue and needs to be warmed up because it won’t work at -40°C. Then, it needs to be cooled because it must generate energy and heat, which it must then cool down. A lithium battery running too hot is not a good thing to have around. They must manage both the heating and cooling in the vehicle, so there’s a whole world there. It’s going to be a fascinating area as we move forward. This energy has to be managed somehow, and we talked about just one little solution.

Ventec is well positioned, and I don’t think we’d thought about the future potential for this. LED lighting is what started everything. We were talking about lighting in homes, stadiums, and on streets, so that’s an area we’re very familiar with. But automotive comes along with a unique set of new challenges and testing regimes—a lot of which are mission critical. If you’re driving your vehicle late at night at 80 miles per hour and all the lights fail, that is not safe and cannot be allowed to happen. We must have things in place to avoid that.

Meanwhile, it’s very different if a light in your home, on the street, or in a stadium goes out. Who cares? In those cases, there’s usually another light, but automotive is significantly different, and we have to understand that. That’s why we have complicated, comprehensive qualification cycles—to make sure the solution we provide is one that will give the satisfaction to the producer for the life of the vehicle and won’t fail.

Warner: Ventec is a global provider of laminates, so where are you seeing the most immediate interest and engagement when you’re talking to T1s?

Morgan: Well, everywhere because although the designs are largely made in Europe and North America for automotive, that’s where the design base sits. The manufacturing system sits in China, so China’s volume of IMS is huge. Volume in Europe and North America is there, but it’s often for prototyping and proof of concept, and then the volume moves to China. We’re certainly a Chinese producer and have production in China and Taiwan, and that’s where the use of our materials is, which helps us. But it’s also important that we can have suppliers in Europe and North America as well. Unless we finish the qualifications in these two regions, we don’t get the volume anyway, so we need that.

And there are special solutions too. I’ve talked a lot about automotive, but there are other areas where the solutions can be on much smaller scales. For example, I talked to a company in Norway called TactoTek that makes printed electronics for automotive interiors. They’re producing these on plastic, printing electronics, and then encapsulating and molding them into shape.

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