Chip-on-Board LED technology describes the mounting of a bare LED chip in direct contact with the substrate to produce LED arrays. It is a method of LED packaging which has a number of advantages over conventional technologies such as “T-pack” and Surface Mount LEDs.

What are Packaged LEDs?

An example of a packaged T-pack LED is shown below. A packaged LED has an optical lens, bonding wire, electrodes, and resin to encapsulate the LED for protection. Surface Mount Devices offer higher packing density over T-pack though still significantly less density than Chip-on-Board.

Why does Chip-on-Board offer advantages over Packaged LEDs?

Due to the small size of the LED chip relative to a packaged LED, Chip-on-Board technology (COB) allows for a much higher packing density than surface mount technology. This results in higher intensity & greater uniformity for the user.

The advantages of Chip-on-Board LED arrays are:

• Compactness, due to small size of the LED chip
• High intensity, particularly at close distances
• High uniformity, even at close working distances
• Best thermal performance for better lifetime, stability, and reliability

Illustrated Example

The figure above shows the number of LEDs that can be placed on a 10mm square area and the resulting array power. As you can see the number of LEDs that can be placed using COB technology is 38 times higher than that of T-Pack technology and 8.5 times higher than with surface mount technology.

Advantages of Chip-on-Board LED technology

The advantages of Chip-on-Board LED arrays include:

• Compactness due to small size of chip
• High-Intensity, particularly at close distance
• High-Uniformity, even at close working distances
• Superior Thermal Performance for better lifetime, stability and reliability

Conclusion

Chip-on-board LED technology offers many advantages when compared to surface-mounted LEDs. The LED packing density achievable with chip-on-board technology allows illumination providers to deliver high intensity, high uniformity, and compact solutions ideal for a wide range of applications. ProPhotonix utilizes more than 25 years of experience in Chip-on-Board technology to provide COB solutions for OEMs and system integrators worldwide.

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Types of LED Arrays

The LED array method that should be used for any given application depends on the light output requirements, the space available for the illuminator, as well as other factors.

Arrays of packaged LEDs can provide adequate intensity and uniformity for some applications, particularly where the working distances are longer. However, in more challenging applications, such as machine vision lighting applications and medical applications, Chip-on-Board LED arrays provide the highest intensity and best uniformity in the most compact form factor.

Compact LED arrays

With Chip-on-Board LED arrays, the dies (chips) are attached directly to a thermally efficient substrate. Due to the small size of the LED chip relative to packaged chips, Chip-on- Board LED arrays contain a higher density and number of LEDs resulting in a higher intensity and more uniform light output.

For more information on how Chip-on-Board LED arrays compare to surface mount technology, see our blog post on The Advantages of Chip on Board vs Surface Mount technology.

With more than 20 years of experience in developing Chip on Board LED solutions, ProPhotonix has the expertise in optical, mechanical, and electronic engineering to provide the optimum Chip on Board LED solution.

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